Detroit Art Review

Critical art reviews of Detroit galleries and museums weekly

Shouldn’t You Be Working? @ MSU Broad Museum

By

On September 11, 2023

In Assemblage / Collage, Design, Installation, Photography, Video

Shouldn’t You Be Working? 100 Years of Working from Home installation view at the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University, 2023. Photo: Vincent Morse/MSU Broad Art Museum.

In 1896, Michigan State University opened the doors to its School of Home Economics, one of the first in the nation. The school even contained a fully functional practice home where the students cooked, cleaned, and hosted events. The home was demolished in 2008, and the Broad Art Museum was erected in its place. Taking its former school of home economics as its reference point, through December 27, the Broad presents Shouldn’t You Be Working? 100 Years of Working From Home. Curated by Teresa Fankhänel, the exhibit features photography, digital media, and installation, and it explores the intersection of work and home life, focusing on how technology and artificial intelligence are shaping the future of both.

This exhibition pairs ten contemporary artists and architects with a selection of photography and ephemera, including archival photographs from the university’s former School of Home Economics. These are paired alongside iconic photographs of workers in their homes, taken by the likes of Walker Evans and Marion Post Wolcott, who, on behalf of the Farm Security Administration, famously documented the lives of the rural workers and sharecroppers who struggled to maintain their livelihoods during the Great Depression.

Records of the MSU School of Home Economics. Courtesy Michigan State University Archives & Historical Collections.

Marion Post Wolcott, A member of the Fred Wilkins family making biscuits for dinner on cornhusking day, Tallyho, near Stem, N.C., 1939. Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum, Michigan State University, purchase, funded by the Emma Grace Holmes Endowment, 2006.33.1

The visual epicenter of the exhibition space is a partial recreation (at a 1 to 1 ratio) of the Paolucci Building, the former home economics practice house that once occupied this site. This interactive structure serves to frame a selection of photography, digital art, and an installation, which explore contemporary intersections of work and home life. Inside, there’s a mock-up of a home office replete with all the trappings of a television studio; a sight which will resonate with any of us who have been on a Zoom call. It also recalls the home studios of the social media “influencers” who ironically manage to create lucrative public careers from the privacy of their homes.  This office installation, Cream Screen, by Marisa Olson, also serves to confront and dismantle the assumption that the technology to work or study remotely is accessible to everyone.

Shouldn’t You Be Working? 100 Years of Working from Home installation view at the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University, 2023. Photo: Vincent Morse/MSU Broad Art Museum.

Shouldn’t You Be Working? 100 Years of Working from Home installation view at the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University, 2023. Photo: Vincent Morse/MSU Broad Art Museum.

Also inside this recreation of the Paolucci Building is a selection of photography by Korean artist Won Kim. His series Living Small shows the cramped living quarters of Tokyo’s pod hotels. Unlike the city’s chic capsule hotels (more refined, but still not for the claustrophobic), these pods are little more than plywood boxes; there’s not even a door or windows. These spaces offer very low-income housing for individuals in between jobs, and are the ultimate expression of minimalist living. These images call to mind the famous photograph Five Cents a Spot taken by Jacob Riis, which shows the crammed tenement housing of some of New York City’s poorest residents.   

Won Kim, Enclosed: Living Small, 2014. Photo print © Won Kim

Several monitors screen short video works that specifically address how technology shapes our work/home balance. Theo Triantafyllidis’ Ork Haus applies a sort of dark, absurdist humor in his digital portrayal of a dysfunctional family of orks (yes, orks) at home during lockdown. All are hopelessly addicted to their screens (VR headsets, TVs, and phones). The papa ork dabbles in cryptocurrency, and his little orkling learns to code; meanwhile, the family is oblivious to real-world catastrophes that surround them, such as the out-of-control fire in their kitchen.

Theo Triantafyllidis, Ork House, 2022. Live simulation video © Theo Triantafyllidis

Merger, a video by Keiichi Matsuda, presents us with a dystopian future in which artificial intelligence has taken over all corporations. The film’s unnamed protagonist has resigned to this digital takeover, acknowledging her status as a human is obsolete, and ultimately makes the decision to transition into a digital entity.

Keiichi Matsuda, Merger, 2018. Video © Keiichi Matsuda

For better or for worse, the boundaries between work and home are shifting. And COVID certainly accelerated the process, turning our homes into workspaces, at least for those of us who were fortunate to have the means to work remotely. This exhibition doesn’t necessarily criticize the advent of new technologies in the home, though it does invite us to pause for a moment and consider what this brave new world will look like.

Shouldn’t You Be Working? is on view at the MSU Broad Art Museum through December 17, 2023.

“One to Remember”, Davariz Broaden @ Louis Buhl & Co.

By

On August 22, 2023

In Paintings

Davariz Broaden, One to Remember, 2023. Installation image.  Photo: PD Rearick. Courtesy of Artist and Louis Buhl & Co.

The rich tradition of figurative painting can be traced back to prehistoric times as a way to portray and represent the artist’s surrounding culture. Infinite stylistic choices have animated the flatness of stone, paper, fabric or canvas to render scenes of adjacent worlds, encouraging viewers to enter, observe and learn from the subjects presented. It has become clear throughout the history of art that the brush holds power in its ability to tell a story, depict current times, or propose a future world, and it is the painters who are conscious of this power that approach their practice with careful attention to detail. The five paintings on display at Louis Buhl & Co. mark a significant point in the career of the artist Davariz Broaden. As a self-taught Detroit-based painter, his professional trajectory has grown quickly since he started exploring the medium in 2021. In just a few years, Broaden’s work has been exhibited locally and nationally as he has become increasingly recognized for his contemporary depictions of Black culture as well as the nostalgia of the Black experience. “One to Remember” is Broaden’s second solo exhibition with Louis Buhl & Co., functioning not only as his official debut into the world of artist representation but also into the world of large scale painting.

Davariz Broaden, Young All Stars, 2023 Acrylic, oil, and sugar on canvas. 70 x 70 in Photo: Tim Johnson. Courtesy of Artist and Louis Buhl & Co.

The collection of works in the wide and shallow Buhl gallery space envelops its guests with what seem like memories of a birthday celebration or a family reunion. Their scale alone allows for relatability as the nearly six feet tall canvases illustrate life-size figures, but in addition to this mirroring of proportions, we witness this party and its nuances as a tradition familiar to so many. The sky jumps from canvas to canvas like a panoramic photograph to enhance the impression of actually being there, while the muted color palette, gentle approach to paint application and unique drawing style combine to promote sensations of movement and life.

Davariz Broaden, Youngest of 4, 2023 Acrylic and oil on canvas 60 x 48 in Photo: Tim Johnson. Courtesy of Artist and Louis Buhl & Co

Prior to 2021, Davariz Broaden worked in other avenues of creative production. While studying Fashion Technology at Kent State University, he expressed a desire to emphasize and foster discussion surrounding the relationship between the past, present and future. Many aspects of Broaden’s current work seem to be continuing on that path. An assessment of his paintings from the beginning until now demonstrates an informed approach to composition and subject, recalling prominent African American artists from the modern era until now. Similar to artists like Kerry James Marshall, Amy Sherrald and Michalene Thomas, Broaden’s strong use of color, his contrasts between light and dark tones and his depictions of love and leisure in Black communities move the Black subject into a future where their main story is no longer of oppression but of autonomy and joy.

Davariz Broaden, Birthdays & Block Parties, 2023 Acrylic, oil, and sugar on canvas 60 x 48 in Photo: Tim Johnson. Courtesy of Artist and Louis Buhl & Co.

The titles of the paintings in “One To Remember” aid in keeping the mood of the show as light as a day at a park. The compositions are based on photographs of family and friends which has become an ongoing trend of Broaden and can be found in work by him that has been previously shown by Luis Buhl & Co., The Detroit Artists Market, M Contemporary in Ferndale, and a solo presentation at Future Art Fair with Medium Tings in New York City. Currently at Louis Buhl & Co., the Young All Stars are four boys wearing matching shirts posing quickly mid-motion. Birthdays & Block Parties shows a boy playing jump rope. Brothers pose with the Youngest of Four in a field with a forest of pine trees in the background. A little girl stays with her mom at the Grown Folks Table where the white styrofoam container emphasizes the mildly flattened perspective that is repeated from painting to painting within the artist’s practice. Broaden’s evolving awareness and comfort with painting has encouraged him to introduce oil to his originally all acrylic-based studio and the combination of the two seems to have even further influenced his already careful approach to textures, colors, fabrics and how they would respond to each other.

Davariz Broaden, Grown Folks Table, 2023, Acrylic and oil on canvas, 60 x 48 in. Photo:Tim Johnson. Courtesy of Artist and Louis Buhl & Co.

A child of Gen Z (born in 1999) Davariz Broaden holds a youthful perspective of everyday subject matter in this contemporary world. This point of view is valued by the curatorial team at Louis Buhl & Co.  The Senior Director Alessandra Ferrara collaborated with Director Caroline Hinnant as well as JJ and Anthony Curis to introduce Broaden to professional strategies to forge and build a successful career as an artist, starting with inviting him to produce a unique series of works on paper and featuring him as an artist in their Salon Highlight initiative. Broaden is now represented by the gallery, who works with him as consultants as well as advocates and exhibitors of his work.

Davariz Broaden, Summer, 2023, Acrylic and oil on canvas, 70 x 70 in. Photo:PD Rearick. Courtesy of Artist and Louis Buhl & Co.

“One to Remember” by Davariz Broaden opened on July 8, 2023 at Louis Buhl & Co. and is on view until September 6, 2023.

Learn more about Louis Buhl & Co here: https://www.louisbuhl.com/

Susan Yamasaki @ Center Gallery

By

On August 6, 2023

In Assemblage / Collage

A Collection of Birch Assemblages at the Center Gallery in Glen Arbor, Michigan.

Installation image, work by Susan Yamasaki at Center Gallery, Glen Arbor, 2023  Image courtesy of Susan Tusa

It has been nineteen years since Susan and Taro move from Birmingham, Michigan, to the glacial moraine in Leelanau County, where their property rises upward to look out over Lake Michigan and the Sleeping Bear Dunes.  The forest comprises thick oaks, pines, black ash, beech/maple, and birch.  A devastating storm in 2015 snapped birch trees in half, and Susan foraged her land to discover this bark from birch trees with a wide diversity of color and texture.

The following birch assemblages are a sample of what is now on display at Center Gallery, opening August 4 -10th, 2023, in Glen Arbor, Michigan.

She says in her statement, “My heart would break as I would step over the wreckage of trees whose lives had ended.  But upon taking a closer look, I could see that the bark of the birch beautifully reveals the experience of the tree.  I chose to use the bark of the fallen birch to make my art.  The panels become sacred objects, honoring the link between earth and sky.  They pay homage to the struggle and adaptability of each tree.”

Susan Yamasaki, Shift, 26 x 31″, Assemblage, 2023  Image courtesy of Taro Yamasaki.

The assemblage is composed formally on a grid and is abstract.  Shift has chevrons on the top and bottom of the center staged rectangle, and the overall pieces are squares with bits and pieces of gold leaf as a border and a punctuated black frame.

Assemblage is the art of creating a three-dimensional sculptural composition from found objects.  One of the best-known assemblage artists of the 20th century was the Russian-born American sculptor Louise Nevelson. She transformed these found objects into large wall-mounted and free-standing reliefs, which often take the form of stacked boxes and compartments.  Once assembled, the sculpture was spray-painted with a single color – usually black, white, or gold – to unify the complex sculptural elements and bring symbolic meaning.

Susan Yamasaki, Hieroglyphs, 35 x 35″, Assemblage, 2021. Image courtesy of Taro Yamasaki.

It is easy to say squares and rectangles dominate the motifs in a background of white in Hieroglyphs, as the square abstraction surrounds a cluster of gold leaf objects.  Found in ancient Egyptian art, the stylized shapes represent a word, syllable, or sound, where gold is designed to elevate the symbol’s value.

Susan Yamasaki, Burnt, 34 x 34″, Assemblage, 2020.    Image courtesy of Taro Yamasaki.

In the work, Burnt, although its background is a field of squares, an overlapping darkened color represents the birch that was touched by fire.  The effect contrasts the composition and moves the action of larger pieces of bark from left to right, repeating the small horizontal lines in many of the squares.

Susan Yamasaki, Underbark, 35 x 30″ Assemblage, 2023, Image courtesy of Taro Yamasaki.

The image Underbark, illustrates how the artist handles color (red and orange), which opens the door to expanding the option to future compositions.  It is noticeable that Susan Yamasaki has a comfort level using a grid-based composition of squares and working overtime on variations of well-established designs of gold leaf borders and black frames until she gets to a point where there are options that present themselves.

Until now, she has created a very personal oeuvre: abstract assemblages based on her relationship with material that is part of her natural environment, but raises the question, where will the work go from here?

Susan Yamasaki, Installation, Assemblages, 2023.  Image courtesy to Taro Yamasaki.

Susan Yamasaki studied art at Michigan State University and then finished at Wayne State University, ultimately with a degree in Art History.  She earned a teaching certificate and taught science at Roeper School in Suburban Detroit.  After moving to northern Michigan, she taught at a public Montessori school in Traverse City.

Susan Yamasaki, Birch Assemblages, Center Gallery in Glen Arbor, Michigan, August 4 – 10, 2023.

James Barnor @ DIA

By

On July 25, 2023

In Photography

James Barnor: Accra/London – A Retrospective at The Detroit Institute of Arts

Ever Young Studio, Jamestown, Accra. 1953 (printed 2010-20) Gelatin silver print. Autograph, London.  All photos images: Ashley Cook

On May 28, The Detroit Institute of Arts celebrated the opening of Accra/London, a comprehensive retrospective of photographs by African photojournalist James Barnor. This exhibition illustrates his dynamic career as a photographer whose work documented the everyday life of Africans in Ghana and the diaspora as well as major turning points in the socio-political landscapes of Accra and London between 1950-1980. Born in 1929, Barnor was a first-hand witness to life under British rule on the Gold Coast. The influence of this experience on his view of the world undeniably guided his choice of subject and composition, and his perspective as a person of African descent led to particularly careful considerations of lighting, framing, and the use of tone and color. As the largest exhibition of his work to date, with over 170 photographs spanning three decades, visitors can now learn not only about James Barnor as an artist, but about the history and evolution of photojournalism as well as the impact that the medium of photography has had on social and political change on race relations between Africa and Great Britain.

Selina Opong, Policewoman No. 10, Ever Young Studio, Jamestown, Accra. 1954 (printed 2010-20) Gelatin silver print. Autograph, London.

The short film presented at the exhibition’s entrance introduces us to the artist as a 91-year-old man keenly recalling details of his life and career. He recounts his youthful experience learning how to use a camera to photograph his friends, family, politicians, and professional athletes. He reflects on his role in documenting the history of Ghana from colonial to post-colonial life, his involvement with DRUM Magazine, and the expansion of his practice from Accra to London. Barnor’s light-hearted disposition in the film helps us understand how he could easily access people of various backgrounds, a trait that has proven to be critical to his professional success over time. Joy is the most consistent emotion detected in his photographs, despite their being taken in a world troubled with political unrest and racial discrimination.

DRUM Magazine, Nigerian Edition, December 1967.

The story told through this retrospective begins with Barnor’s entrance into the professional world of photography. He started to work with the Daily Graphic newspaper in 1950 and established the Ever Young Graphic Studio in 1953 as an open-air studio on the streets of Accra. Eventually, Ever Young moved to a permanent location, and Barnor used his autonomy as the business owner to explore and develop his approach to taking portraits. He depicted African life on the coast of the Atlantic and its backdrop of colonial oversight. Indigenous fishing boats share a frame with James Fort, Barnor’s friends drive a car with an iconic lighthouse in the background; elsewhere, men and women are photographed in the studio dressed in their professional uniforms. His portraits of men, women, youth and children portray the successes of local people who he recounted in interviews as having been motivated by the excitement for liberation that was on their minds and in their hearts at that time.

Muhammad Ali preparing for his fight against Brian London, 1966 (printed 2010-20) Gelatin silver print. Galerie Clémentine de la Féronnière , Paris.

Enlarged wall images, detailed placards, vintage cameras and copies of magazines are on view throughout the space to further support the storytelling efforts of the curators. Accra/London initially debuted at the Serpentine Gallery, London in 2021. Organized by Chief Curator Lizzie Carey-Thomas in collaboration with Awa Konaté, the Assistant Curator of the Culture Art Society, Clémentine de la Féronnière, Sophie Culière of the James Barnor Archives and Isabella Senuita. The exhibition was presented at MASI in Lugano, Switzerland in 2022 before coming to Detroit. The Detroit Institute of Arts recently acquired 22 of Barnor’s photographs (now included in the Detroit-based installation of Accra/London) in an effort to diversify the museum’s world-renowned collection and to enhance its holdings of works by living African artists.  Nii Quarcoopome, the DIA’s Curator of African Art, and Nancy Barr, the James Pearson Duffy Curator of Photography, worked together to bring this exhibition to a Midwest audience as part of the Detroit Institute of Art’s ongoing effort to promote its representation of people of color.

Ring Road, Accra, 1974 (printed 2010-20) Chromogenic print. Galerie Clémentine de la Féronnière, Paris.

Despite the collection on view being only a small sampling of Barnor’s entire archive of more than 32,000 images spanning six decades, it acts as a marker of the global growth in representation between 1950-1980 of people of color. In Accra, the photographer witnessed Ghanian boxer Ginger Nyarku publicly defeat his British opponent which challenged contemporary ideas of European superiority. He witnessed nurses, accountants, teachers and lawyers on the Gold Coast working together to weaken Britain’s control from within their government positions. He witnessed the transition of power from Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain to Kwame Nkruma of Ghana. He witnessed a growing presence of African models on the covers of magazines in London and Barnor participated in all of this by presenting opportunities for them to be seen. His sitters were these mothers with their children, these models, these athletes, these politicians. They were carefully photographed with lighting that complimented their skin tone, and angles that framed their traditional hairstyles. They were positioned in ways that displayed the traditional patterns on their clothing. They were all shown to be confident and proud.

A woman holding a baby after the wedding of Mr. and Mrs. Sackey, Balham, London, about 1966 (printed 2010-20) Gelatin Silver print. Galerie Clémentine de la Féronnière, Paris.

 Although Barnor found racism embedded throughout the United Kingdom and its colonies from the time he arrived in London until he left, the discriminatory laws and customs were not strong enough to prevent a growing appreciation for Black culture. People of both African and European descent crossed strict boundaries and protested discrimination by actively celebrating the intermingling of cultures and the exchange of knowledge it allowed. Because of this, white subjects became increasingly prevalent in Barnor’s work. Joyful dissent was recorded in everyday-life moments of interracial couples and multi-racial friend groups while a growing number of Black figures began to appear in roles they previously were not allowed to have and in places that they were previously not permitted to be.

Installation, James Barnor: Accra/London – A Retrospective at The Detroit Institute of Arts. Image courtesy of DAR

James Barnor: Accra/London – A Retrospective is on view at The Detroit Institute of Arts until Closing October 15, 2023

Mark Newport and Jane Lackey @ Simone DeSousa Gallery

By

On July 7, 2023

In Paintings

Mark Newport and Jane Lackey: Correspondence  @ Simone DeSousa Gallery

Installation image out front of Gallery. All images courtesy of Simone De Sousa Gallery

Former Fiber Artists-in-Residence, Mark Newport (2007-2023) and Jane Lackey (1997-2007), who served long tenures at Cranbrook Academy of Art, have reunited in a two-person exhibition at Simone DeSousa Gallery in Detroit. Though both have developed singular practices and careers, their show, self-titled Correspondence, showcases underlying similarities in their art-making processes. Indeed, despite their physical distance from one another–Newport works in the Detroit area while Lackey has resided in New Mexico since 2009–they remain in touch and together initiated the exhibition concept.

Installation view of Mark Newport and Jane Lackey: Correspondence

At first glance, observing their art on opposite walls in the main gallery, one might think the two clusters of art represent antithetical points of view and execution. Newport’s robust stitchery versus Lackey’s inclination to highlight the process of flowing; his darkling monochromatic palette, her startling cobalt blues; his army blanket supports, her meticulously hand-drawn grids on paper; his gnarly surfaces, her neat, calm meshes; his irregularly shaped compositions, her Spartan rectangles.

Yet correspondences, as Newport and Lackey remind us, emerge upon further viewing: their vertical compositions convey a kind of order and classical uniformity; asymmetric shapes and forms enliven and colorize the pictorial spaces; both employ open ended, ad hoc creative techniques; and repetitive titles emphasize the seriously serial explorations of mending and flowing, the common but enthralling modus operandi of these two makers.

Mark Newport, Mend 21, Wool, acrylic, cotton, 40 x 28 in., 2021. Photo: George P. Perez

Mend 21 (2021), a prime example of one of Newport’s ongoing Mending series, began, like most, with a cut into the wool army blanket material, indicative of the inevitable tears and abrasions in a fabric used to warm and protect a vulnerable body. The subsequent mending of the cut, via darning and embroidery, leaves a physical reminder of the repair or “scab,” as per the artist.  Executed with thick or thin thread, the circular or rectangular halos surrounding these wounds add subtle color and texture to the gray wool ground of the blanket.

Mark Newport, Swathe, Wool, acrylic, cotton, 83 x 59 in., 2023. Photo: George P. Perez

Swathe (2023), the largest and one of the latest Newport works on view, is boldly and brazenly colorful, sporting three swaths of yellow at the left, a squiggly yellow line above, green, black, and brown horizontal stitching within two amoebic forms near the top, plus an organic oozing of multicolor hues at mid-center countered by a punchy red and black plaid patch at lower right. Moreover, the scrunched and bunched ball of fabric right of center heightens tactility and tautens Swathe’s irregular shape.

Jane Lackey, Almost being said, flow 3, Acrylic, ink, graphite, paper, 35 x 23 in., 2022. Photo: Addison Doty

Lackey’s Almost being said, flow 3 (2022), one of her identically titled drawings (with numerical designations), establishes the format for a quartet of spare, asymmetric arrangements of flowing cobalt forms encroaching upon precisely drawn paper grids. Like Newport, she too begins with consistent support, his an army blanket, hers a grid, that each artist then disrupts or interrupts. Here, in flow 3, two cobalt forms appear to be advancing toward the center, one on the left edging in slowly, the other at the upper right moving (hurtling?) comet-like toward the center. As Lackey’s lyrical titles imply, something undefined is being said, thought or felt, but provocatively, what that is, is only “almost” laid bare.

Jane Lackey, Almost being said, flow 4, Acrylic, ink, graphite, paper, 35 x 23 in., 2022. Photo: Addison Doty

Similarly, in Almost being said, flow 4 (2022), the slowly descending blue form appears to be on the verge of enveloping the tight, orderly grid. The tempo varies from composition to composition, evoking states of mind, emotional ups and downs, shifting moods and, as Lackey observes, “assertions of self within a plaid of connective tissue.”

Hence, Mark Newport and Jane Lackey: Together and apart, singular but connected, Midwesterner and Southwesterner, two makers linked across the miles via stitching and flowing. Correspondence, not competition, as they’ve confirmed, is the order of the day.

Correspondence is on view at Simone DeSousa Gallery, 444 W. Willis St., Detroit, MI, through August 12, 2023.

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