“…Kay Brown (1932-2012) was an African American artist and one of the founders of the Where We At Black women artists’ collective in New York City. She was also a member of the Weusi Artist Collective, based in Harlem during the 1960s and 1970s….”
A Swahili word meaning blackness, “Weusi” is also the name of a distinguished collective of artists established in Harlem during the 1960’s against the Black Arts Movement. This video is a sampling from interviews with 17 Weusi artists still working in New York City.
“ … In early 1971, Kay Brown, Dindga McCannon, and Faith Ringgold gathered a group of black women at McCannon’s Brooklyn home to discuss their common frustrations in trying to build their careers as artists… Out of this initial gathering came one of the first exhibitions of professional black women artists: “Where We At”—Black Women Artists, 1971. Adopting the show’s title as its name, the collective began meeting at members’ homes and studios, building support systems for making their work while assisting each other with childcare and other domestic labor. Where We At recognized the power of collectivity—empowering black women by creating a network to help them attain their professional goals as artists…”
Printmaking/Art History. Black Printmakers/Artists: Emma Amos.
In August of 1963, The March on Washington was held to advocate for the civil rights of African Americans. Martin Luther King Jr delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech, calling for an end to racism.
The art collective, The Spiral Group formed as a result of the march.
“…Spiral was a New York–based collective of African-American artists that came together in the 1960s to discuss their relationship to the civil rights movement and the shifting landscape of American art, culture and politics…”
An artist in the group who I particularly admire is Emma Amos.
Emma Amos (1937 – 2020) was invited in 1963, by her professor, “…Hale Woodruff to become a member of Spiral, a group of black artists that included Romare Bearden, Norman Lewis, and Charles Alston. She was the group’s youngest and only female member…”
Prints and paintings by Emma Amos are in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Studio Museum of Harlem, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Brooklyn Museum. Emma Amos died on May 21 at her home in Bedford, N.H. She was 83. In 2021, a retrospective of the artist’s work will open in her home state, at the Georgia Museum of Art in Athens.
Stars and Stripes,
monotype with George Shivery photo transfer, 1995
About Whiteness (Red)
oil and laser transfer on paper. 1995
Measuring, Measuring
Acrylic on linen canvas, Kente fragment, batiked hand swatches, African strip woven borders, and laser-transfer photographs, 1995
Mississippi Wagon, 1937,
print, 1992
My Mothers, My Sisters,
lithograph, handmade paper collage, African fabric border, 1992
Contemporary African American artists continue the work of Spiral:
Black Art In America
SPIRAL NOW 55 Years Later: New Artists, Familiar Struggle
SAMELLA
LEWIS, born in New Orleans in 1924 is rightfully considered one of the most influential
artists/art historians in the United States.
“… As a
young artist, she was drawn to subjects as diverse as police brutality against
African Americans, comic books, and characters from her older sister's romance
novels…”
She “…became
the first African American to receive doctorates in Fine Art and Art
History.Dr. Lewis attended Dillard
University, Hampton Institute, and Ohio State University. She taught as a
full-time professor at Morgan State University, Florida A&M, State
University New York Plattsburgh, California State Dominguez, California State
Long Beach, and Scripps College…”
Dr.
Lewis“…was an active member of the
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, making her a target
of government officials who accused her of being a Communist and members of the
Ku Klux Klan who shot out windows of her home. Undaunted, she founded a chapter
of the NAACP in Plattsburgh.
‘Lewis
has changed the landscape of Art History and has become an influential and
highly respected voice that has also mentored and bolstered the careers of many
African American artists. She is the recipient of a myriad of awards and
distinctions and has exhibited in many important galleries and museums.”
“I fight against segregation, discrimination,
racism, brutality and depravity because these things deny people their rights
as human beings.” -- Samella Lewis. (Credit: Daily Bulletin)
House
of Shango
Lithograph.
1992
“The
title of this piece is an unmistakable harkening to African roots. Shango is a
religious practice with origins in Yoruba (Nigerian) belief, deifying a god of
thunder by the same name…”
Printmaking in the time of
COVID-19. Small Exhibitions: Who are the people COVID – 19 is Killing in Your
Neighborhood?
Revisiting Navajo Nation
Printmaking.
Featured Artist: Nani
Chacon
Time to check back in with
the Navajo Nation, the "Dineh" or "the People" to see how
their battle with COVID – 19 is progressing.
A brief review of the
Navajo Nation:
In 1864,
"Kit" Carson and the United States federal government enacted a plan
of ethnic cleansing and forced the relocation of the Navajo from their
ancestral homelands to Fort Summer, a 40-square-mile reservation in eastern New
Mexico. Years later the U.S.-Navajo Treaty of 1868 allowed the Navajo to return
to only a small portion of their original homeland.I’m betting your history books didn’t inform
you of the forced “Long Walk of the Navajo.”
Largest of all U.S.
Indian reservations, covers 27,413 sq. miles
Only twelve Health
Service facilities to serve over 350,000 citizens.
The facilities have
only 28 ventilators.
In Mid May when the
Athraigh Studio first featured Navajo printmakers the Navajo had suffered at
least 3,392 cases of COVID – 19 and 119 known deaths.
“Cases on Navajo Nation
peaked in May, with an average of 104 new cases per day. By July, that number
dropped by half to about 48 new cases reported each day. In all, about 9,000 of
the roughly 172,000 Navajo members living on and around the reservation have
tested positive and more than 450 have died from the virus…. Local officials
say Navajo Nation’s success in flattening the curve has been largely due to
three things: widespread adherence to mask-wearing and social distancing, one
of the strictest stay-at-home curfews in the country and an aggressive testing
regime.”
“The coronavirus was so
devastating on Navajo Nation in part, experts say, because of severely lacking
infrastructure on the reservation. An estimated 30 percent of homes don’t have
running water…”
The Navajo have shovel
ready plans to improve their infastructure and hope to use some of the $714
million in federal aid they received from the CARES Act. A deadline mandates
the money be spent by Dec. 30 or the tribes risk have to send it back.
“Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez…wants to spend
the money on expanding access to running water and electricity and providing
broadband access and more affordable housing on the reservation — in effect
addressing the infrastructure gaps that experts said contributed to COVID-19’s
deadliness there…”https://www.nbcnews.com/specials/navajo-nation-fears-second-covid-19-wave/index.html
Spending the money by the
end of the year is close to impossible, “… because most tribal land is held
in trust, and technically owned by the federal government, development on many
tribal lands is fraught with complications..”
The Navajo asked the Trump administration in June to waive some federal
regulations so the tribe could fast-track development projects. It’s now August
and they’ve heard nothing.
U.S. Rep. Tom O’Halleran,
D-Ariz., introduced a bipartisan bill to extend the spending deadline for
tribal governments to 2022.
So, the Navajo continue to
fight COVID, fight the Trump administration to build infrastructure on a small
portion of their original homeland and face the annual summer drought.
So, if we simply focus on
water… Digging new water lines and building water towers on the reservation is
difficult due to the federal and tribal regulations. Please consider supporting
DigDeep.
“DigDeep”, a human rights
nonprofit serves the 2.2 million+ Americans without the sinks, bathtubs or
toilets has established The Navajo Water Project.
“Agua es Vida” signed
and numbered serigraph Print.
“honoring the
historical and traditional connections we have with have with water, with the
water that lives in us, is the water of centuries” Nanibah.
Who is Getting Rich from
COVID – 19 in Your Neighborhood?
Minnesota sulfide mining vs The Ojibwe.
Featured artist:Ojibwe artist Jim Denomie
Ojibwe artist Jim
Denomie
Toast Series
Monoprint with oil
pastel
Over 150,000 people have
now died from COVID - 19. Our government officials don’t want you to see the
numbers but we all know each number is/was a person. To personalize COVID, Athraigh
Studio continues its effort to look beyond the numbers and into the art made by
the people.
In the U.S. people of
color are at greater risk than others. Among the most vulnerable are Native
Americans.In today’s,exhibit detailing Who are the people COVID
– 19 is Killing in Your Neighborhood?, Athraigh Studio brings you examples
of the art of The Ojibwe and a few related details regarding their battle to
save the earth and their people from the greed of the mining companies.
Have you ever been to the
boundary waters in Northern Minnesota?
“At over 1.1 million
acres, the BWCA contains more than 1,100 lakes, 1200 miles of canoe routes, a
dozen rugged hiking trails and endless opportunities to explore and discover an
adventure.”
https://www.friends-bwca.org/
In 2018, “… the Trump
administration announced it would reinstate Twin Metals’ expired mineral leases
at the edge of the Boundary Waters. Later that year, the Administration
canceled a study into a 20-year moratorium on sulfide mining in parts of the
Superior National Forest…”
https://www.friends-bwca.org/
This opened the door for Antofagasta,
a Chilean-owned mining conglomerate who is working to open a sulfide mine at the edge of the Boundary
Waters.
A quick couple of facts
about sulfide mining:
“Because of its
inherently polluting nature, the EPA has called hard-rock mining (or sulfide
mining) the most toxic industry in the country.
In fact, there has
never been a sulfide mine that has not polluted surrounding water sources.
Even worse, the
pollution from sulfide mining is nearly impossible to contain and can last for
hundreds, even thousands of years…”
So, if all goes as planned
for Antofagasta, you should expect to paddle your canoe through “acid mine drainage”:
sulfuric acid and heavy metals such as mercury, lead, arsenic and other toxins.
Picture the pristine
Boundary Waters and the people who originally called the location home:
“The Boundary Waters
Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW)… Between
2.5 million and 10,000 years ago, glaciers from the last ice age shaped the
lakes and rivers that the BWCAW became known for. Lakes and streams cover about
190,000 acres of its over-one-million-acre surface area.
Before European
exploration and immigration, Dakota, Ojibwe, and other Indigenous people lived
on the lands that now make up the BWCAW.”
The Ojibwe and the Minnesota
Chippewa Tribe opposition to the mining threat has been met by calls to boycott
their casinos and businesses by
“ … former Minnesota
Senate Minority Leader and big-time sulfide mining supporter Tom Bakk and Ely
Minnesota mayor, Chuck Novak,urging a wider boycott of Ojibwe businesses…”
The Ojibwe and the Chippewa
now struggle to contain COVID 19 with limited resources and to preserve the Boundary
Waters. In recognition of their effort, Athraigh Studio would like to help make
you familiar with the art created by Ojibwe artist Jim Denomie:
“Denomie, a member of the
Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Ojibwe, combines vivid hues and disarming humor in
powerful narrative paintings that invite new perspectives on historical and
contemporary events in Indigenous and American life…”
The Kick of Life 
