Contents for January 10, 2022
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Steve Dubin, FF Alumn, In Memoriam
Weekly Spotlight: Pearl Ubungen, FF Alumn, now online
1. Chloë Bass, Susan Weil, Adrianne Wortzel at Center for Book Arts, Manhattan, January 14-March 26
2. Ishmael Houston-Jones, FF Alumn, online January 10
3. Nicolás Dumit Estévez Raful Espejo Ovalles, FF Alumn, at Studio Artego, Long Island City, opening Jan. 15
4. Dick Zigun, FF Alumn, now online in The New York Times
5. Susan Leopold, FF Alumn, at Elizabeth Harris Gallery, Manhattan, thru Feb. 19
6. Carrie Moyer, FF Alumn, at EFA Project Space, Manhattan, opening Jan. 13
7. Katya Grokhovsky, FF Alumn, at EFA Studio Program, Manhattan, Jan. 13-April 14.
8. Mark Tribe, FF Alumn, at Minus Space, Brooklyn, thru Feb. 26
9. Olivia Beens, FF Alumn, at Carter Burden Gallery, Manhattan, Jan. 13- Feb. 9
10. Mark Bloch, FF Alumn, now online in Tokion magazine
11. #Sergina, FF Alumn, live online January 11, 2022
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Steve Dubin, FF Alumn, In Memoriam
Dr. Steven C. Dubin
November 5, 1949-December 4, 2021
Our dearest friend Dr. Steven C. Dubin peacefully passed away on December 4, 2021, at New
York-Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medical Center in New York City after a long battle with cancer.
Born in Kansas City, Missouri, Steven spent his youth there until he attended college at the University of Missouri, Columbia. He is preceded in death by his grandparents Morris and Bala Dubitsky, his parents Schultz and Sarah Dubin (Dubitsky), and his brother Marshall. Steven received his Master’s and Doctorate degrees from The University of Chicago. He completed postdoctoral work at both The University of Chicago and Yale University. He was retired as Professor Emeritus of Sociology from Teachers College, Columbia University where he served as Professor of Arts Administration. Prior, he was a member of the sociology faculty at Purchase College, SUNY for 19 years where he was a founding member of the Media, Society, and the Arts program.
He authored a compendium of important books on the arts and sociology including Spearheading Debate: Culture Wars and Uneasy Truces; Transforming Museums: Mounting Queen Victoria in a Democratic South Africa; Displays of Power: Memory and Amnesia in the American Museum; Displays of Power: Controversy in the American Museum from the Enola Gay to Sensation; Arresting Images: Impolitic Art and Uncivil Actions; and Bureaucratizing the Muse: Public Funds and the Cultural Worker.
Additionally, Steven authored many articles and reviews in major publications including Art in America, The Nation, American Journal of Sociology, Social Forces, African Arts, New Art Examiner, Art Journal of the College Art Association, Visual Anthropology, and many more. His work engaged a wide readership that extended beyond the academy to include artists and arts administrators, curators, critics, and the general public. Arresting Images was named a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. He was the recipient of two Fulbright Fellowships, was twice a visiting professor at Hebrew University, Jerusalem, and was twice a resident at the Bellagio Center in Italy.
Steven devoted his life to his many passions as an educator, writer, and collector in the arenas of culture and society, censorship in art and politics, mass media, deviance/sexuality/social control, collective memory, museum studies, and most importantly, the culture and politics of South Africa where he spent a portion of most years living while doing research and adding to his important collection of African art, artifacts, and photography.
Most recently, Steven had been focusing on his collection of photographs by South African photographer Singaruum Jeevaruthnam Moodley (1922-1987), a.k.a. ‘Kitty’ from which he curated a series of exhibitions that appeared in Johannesburg, New York, and London. He recently completed his book, Bronzeville Nights: On the Town in Chicago’s Black Metropolis which features his research and collection of photographs by Chicago photographer and musician Lonnie Simmons.
Steven’s final project was to complete the book he always called his “cancer book,” A Greatness Too Much: A Year in a Life with Cancer. It is a wondrous soliloquy of his many journeys through life.
Steven will be missed but well remembered by his many, many dear friends, colleagues, and students around the world. As per his request, his ashes will be returned to the Koppies of his beloved South Africa.
-Kenneth C. Burkhart
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Weekly Spotlight: Pearl Ubungen, FF Alumn, now online at https://franklinfurnace.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p17325coll1/id/15/rec/128
This weekly spotlight shines on an 11-minute solo from “T.R.O. (Temporary Restraining Order),” a performance by Pearl Ubungen. Presented on September 13, 1993 with Movement Research at Judson Church, Manhattan, the performance on the topic of violence against women was presented in three acts. It opens with “Olongapo Bitch” and slides of young Thai sex workers accompanied by readings, music, and dance, followed by “It’s a Man’s World.” The excerpt here is from the final act, “Justifiable Homicide,” a blend of dance, monolog, gesture, percussion, and “codependent” love songs. Informed by interviews with former battered women, their stories are layered into the piece through Ubungen’s collaboration with sound artist Randy Odell, photographer Ken Miller, and reading by Walter Krochmal. “T.R.O.” is about the body as the site of experience and the dynamic relationship between thought and feeling. It asks the viewer to immerse themselves within the psyche of its central figure, and experience the volatile waters of love and pain. More about Pearl Ubungen is at pearlubungen.com (text by Annalise Lozier, FF university intern 2021)
Please watch here:
https://franklinfurnace.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p17325coll1/id/15/rec/128
Thank you!
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1. Chloë Bass, Susan Weil, Adrianne Wortzel at Center for Book Arts, Manhattan, January 14-March 26
Please visit the following link:
https://centerforbookarts.org/daily-ritual-exhibition
Thank you.
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2. Ishmael Houston-Jones, FF Alumn, online January 10
Please watch the following video:
Thank you.
A short video trailer for the streaming of TRY, the performance I’ve been working on since fall 2020 and which premiered last November. Worked with an amazing cohort of comrades. It will stream next Monday, January 10 at 6:30 PST 9:30 EST. Also posting the link for (free) tickets.
To get tickets, please register below:
Thank you.
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3. Nicolás Dumit Estévez Raful Espejo Ovalles, FF Alumn, at Studio Artego, Long Island City, opening Jan. 15
Noodle, Rice, and Bread
The Cultural Dialogue Between Art and Food
January 15 – February 26, 2022
Gallery Artego LLC
32-78 48th Street Long Island City NY 11103
Curated by Soojung Hyun
Artists:
Seongmin Ahn
Hayoon Jay Lee
Eung Ho Park
Nicolás Dumit Estévez Raful Espejo Ovalles
This exhibition will examine some remarkable art works related to images of food. The show’s title, Noodles, Rice, and Bread, presents three foods appropriated from our international diet. Each of them offers a metaphor in relation to the different cultures from which they are taken. Each food originates from a region, which holds its own cultural climate. These variations are fused in a manner that reinforces our ability to recognize our humanity. Our exhibition opens various intersections by giving attention to both Eastern and Western cultures, and in doing so, reveals an important ongoing dialogue between contemporary art and various traditions involving food.
Despite different backgrounds, each food gives us the necessary nutrients to sustain life. Just as food allows people to join together, we believe that art has the potential to do much the same. In either case, art and food become facilitators by which to understand our global environment more deeply. Both have the propensity to give pleasure by sharing what they have in common. The space of art and the aura of food connect people in ways that give them a true sense of pleasure in life. The current exhibition has been curated with this idea in mind, hoping this dialogue between art and food will translate its meaning effectively.
Nicolás Dumit Estévez Raful Espejo Ovalles will present
Arroz sin Pollo (Rice without Chicken), a sound piece of 40 sects
Voice: Rebecca Herman
Audio recording and editing: Mark Shoffner
Nicolás Dumit Estévez Raful Espejo Ovalles is a multimedia artist, performer, author, and curator who has a perspective of a Lebanese-Dominican in the United States. His work is presented through audio recordings, photographs, podcasts, drawings, costumes, websites, videos, publications, etc. Personal experiences have informed his artistic practice in immigration, cultural hybridization. Arroz sin Pollo (Rice without Chicken), which is a sound piece of 40 sects, is the minimalist counterpart of a traditional Caribbean recipe, which consists of a mixture of rice and chicken prepared with tomato sauce, and seasoned with garlic, cilantro, onion, peppers, Spanish olives, and salt. The dish is presented without chicken or any other ingredients, allowing for a detailed examination of the formal properties of the grain itself. The artist says, “Arroz sin Pollo raises questions as to what is considered global and universal.” Longwood Arts Project at PERFORMA 05 first presented this audio as part of a curatorial project by Edwin Ramoran.
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4. Dick Zigun, FF Alumn, now online in The New York Times
Please visit the following link:
Thank you.
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5. Susan Leopold, FF Alumn, at Elizabeth Harris Gallery, Manhattan, thru Feb. 19
Happy New Year! May 2022 bring peace and good health to you all. It’s been a roller coaster of a year!
I’m excited to announce my exhibition School(s) at Elizabeth Harris Gallery, which begin on Saturday, January 8th. James Biederman will be exhibiting his new work in the front gallery.
Though the show opens on jan 8th there is no formal opening. Due to the pandemic I will not be in attendance on the 8th. Masks are required and social distancing protocols will be observed.
The exhibition is from January 8 – February 19, 2022.
gallery hours
tuesday – saturday, 12 – 6 pm
and by appointment
Elizabeth Harris Gallery
529 West 20th Street
NYC, NY 10011
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6. Carrie Moyer, FF Alumn, at EFA Project Space, Manhattan, opening Jan. 13
Cosmic Geometries
January 14 – February 26, 2022
EFA Project Space
Artists: Natessa Amin, Yevgeniya Baras, Lisa Beck, Biren De, Grace DeGennaro, Evie Falci, Anoka Faruqee & David Driscoll, Rico Gatson, Diana Guerrero-Maciá, Xylor Jane, Valerie Jaudon, Laleh Khorramian, Julia Kunin, Marilyn Lerner, Anne Lindberg, Mahirwan Mamtani, Carrie Moyer, Stephen Mueller, Sky Pape, Dorothea Rockburne, A.V. Ryan, Laurel Sparks, Barbara Takenaga, Jackie Tileston, Johanna Unzueta
Organized by Hilma’s Ghost (Sharmistha Ray and Dannielle Tegeder)
Virtual Opening Reception: Thursday, January 13, 2022 from 3-4:30 pm.
Cosmic Geometries is a group exhibition of intergenerational and intersectional artists that examines the spiritual and aesthetic functions of abstract painting and geometry in art. The artists deploy a range of painterly devices to create cosmic and transcendental visions that combine esoteric world traditions with the language of Modernism. Their motifs are inspired by sources as divergent as Islamic architecture, Buddhist mandalas, Hindu yantras, medieval Christian stained-glass windows, and quantum mechanics, rendering formal devices that range from tessellations, optical illusions, to elaborate ornamentation techniques. These artists primarily work with the language of painting, but also draw from languages and materials adapted from sculpture, installation, craft, textiles, and ceramics. Within these works lies a rich sensibility for color, shape, and compositional elements, which reveal the daring sensibilities that artists are bringing to the historically overlooked arena of the spiritual in art. These artists’ practices build upon palimpsest legacies of alternative power structures that are constantly being erased.
Gallery Hours: Wednesday-Saturday, 12-6 PM
For more information, please visit the following website:
Thank you.
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7. Katya Grokhovsky, FF Alumn, at EFA Studio Program, Manhattan, Jan. 13-April 14.
Dread In The Eyes
January 13 – April 14, 2022
EFA Studio Program
Artists: Samira Abbassy, Allen T. Ball, Michael Eade, Sally Egbert, Jason File, Katya Grokhovsky, Edgar Jerins, Kosuke Kawahara, Greg Kwiatek, Dana Levy, Cheryl Molnar, Nazanin Noroozi, Whitney Oldenburg
Curated by Deric Carner
Darker themes have soaked into the artwork being made at EFA Studios. Recent times have tested many people’s optimism and it is no surprise that artists have picked up on a sense of dread and upheaval in the air. Fire, disease, flood and food insecurity are in the media and evident on our streets. Artists are barometers of change, sensing the coming storm, and recording its erratic progress. The artists in this exhibition have created visual traces and frameworks for contemplating the turmoil that is often seen at a remove on screens. Some artists have worked in this vein for years already, having been buffeted by the stress of precarity and sensitivity to injustice. Others know of deep loss that has no resolution. There is dread but also hope in the eyes of artists.
For more information, please visit the following website:
Thank you.
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8. Mark Tribe, FF Alumn, at Minus Space, Brooklyn, thru Feb. 26
Dear Friends,
Mark Tribe: Landscape Pictures opens tomorrow, January 8, at Minus Space, 16 Main Street, in the Dumbo neighborhood of Brooklyn.
No opening reception, thanks to Omicron, but I’ll be at the gallery from 1-5pm tomorrow and would love to see you, masks and all. The gallery will be open Saturdays from 11-5 and by appointment. I’d be happy to meet you there just about any time during the run of the show, which ends on February 26. I’ll also be giving a Zoom talk on January 13 at 7pm.
The show includes recent paintings (with digitally milled frames), a 24-hour landscape recording, several photographs, and some large computer-generated aerial landscapes.
Hope to see you there. In the meantime, stay safe!
-Mark
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9. Olivia Beens, FF Alumn, at Carter Burden Gallery, Manhattan, Jan. 13- Feb. 9
I am very pleased to announce that my installation “Tatanka” about the Wyoming landscape and the buffalo is on view at;
Carter Burden Gallery
548 W 28 St #534. (bet 10th and 11th Ave)
New York, NY 10001
January 13-February 9, 2022
Tuesday to Friday 11-5
Saturday 11-6
I will be present Saturday January 22, 2-6pm
or by appointment
Also on view “It Speaks for Itself” Rifka Milder, Arnold Brooks, Julie Tesser
and Lost +(Re )found
A group show by the New York Artists Circle
my very best,
Olivia Beens
oliviabeens.net
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10. Mark Bloch, FF Alumn, now online in Tokion magazine
I’m so pleased to be part of TOKION a new online magazine in Japan with an article on the late, great Shigeko Kubota, video art rule breaker, early Fluxist, Feminist, and Duchampian. The widow and memorializer of Nam June Paik. A WYSIWYG diarist in the style of Jonas Mekas. She has major shows in Tokyo and in New York right now. It was an honor to just recount her biography a bit for a general audience in Tokyo.
Please visit the following website:
https://tokion.jp/en/2022/01/04/shigeko-kubota-avant-garde-art-and-feminism/
Thank you.
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11. #Sergina, FF Alumn, live online January 11, 2022
I’m doing an online performance tomorrow called HOW ARE YOU? #Sergina’s Participatory Soap Opera about Wrestling with Wellbeing in the Digital Age – as part of Axisweb’s week of activities for and about Mental Health for artists: https://www.axisweb.org/article/axis-live-january-2022/
The performance takes place at 13.00 GMT (8AM NYC time!) and lasts an hour, with some time for discussion afterwards.
#Sergina is performed this time by Elly Clarke and Vladimir Bjelicic.
The event is FREE to attend. Please RSVP your spot at the following link:
Thank you.
HOW ARE YOU? #Sergina’s Participatory Soap Opera About Wrestling with Wellbeing in the Digital Age#Sergina (plural) invites you to HOW ARE YOU? #Sergina’s Participatory Soap Opera About Wrestling with Wellbeing in the Digital Age – a lunchtime therapy session that puts your wellbeing on top of the agenda. The questions we will ask you include: What do you feel? What are you feeling right now? Can you be good to people? Can you make people feel good? Can you heal people, can you heal yourself? Can you be reformative? Can you be positive? Can you be hopeful? What is unity? Can we make each other feel good? Can we be reformative together? Participation is via Zoom. If you prefer to be a Voyeur you can do this (and still participate up to a point) via Axisweb’s YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/axisweb1
The performance will take place over Three Acts; Your Data Will Be Gathered With Consent. Choose Your Channel. Use Your Phone.
Refreshments are not provided but would help lubricate the action. See more about #Sergina on Instagram, Facebook, and Soundcloud.About #Sergina#Sergina is a self-sculpted c-celeb, waiting for her social media presence to take off. In her spare time she writes songs about having her phone in my wallet, waiting to download and that kind of thing. Played (out) on different bodies, she appears in one place or many at once, on screen and on stage. She is waiting for her big break. But she doesn’t like waiting. She doesn’t like waiting for ice cream. She doesn’t like waiting for donuts. She competes with her own image and usually lose. Filters are fabulous. This past year, stuck at home/s, #Sergina expanded her horizons to offer relationship advice webinars and mug and fluffy inside laptop case production. Bring your phone and your data for some top secret sharings. It will be delicious to see you.
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Goings On is compiled weekly by Danelly Reyes, Franklin Furnace University Intern, Winter 2022
