Last week, the Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) acquired “Bird” (1990), a striking sculpture by David Hammons.
Hank Willis Thomas
Posted inArt
Dread Scott Discusses Controversial Lynching Banner that Sparked Threats
For one week, the monumental flag bearing the text, “A MAN WAS LYNCHED BY POLICE YESTERDAY” flew outside Jack Shainman Gallery’s West 20th location as Dread Scott’s unfortunate update to the nearly identical one the NAACP once flew outside its Manhattan headquarters.
Posted inBooks
The Politics of Seeing, Being, and Visibility in Photography
It doesn’t seem right to call the latest issue of Aperture — its first issue dedicated to African American lives as represented by the medium of photography — a magazine. It is a powerhouse book; it does so much heavy lifting.
Posted inPodcast
Hank Willis Thomas and Eric Gottesman on Their Arts-Centric Super PAC #Podcast
In our third episode of the Hyperallergic Podcast, we talk to artists Hank Willis Thomas and Eric Gottesman about their For Freedoms Super PAC.
Posted inArt
The Tragedies and Triumphs of American Athletes of Color
At Fort Gansevoort Gallery, there is a new art exhibition with titular claim to the annual Division 1 men’s college basketball tournament.
Posted inArt
“All Lives Are Black Lives”: Examining Race in South Africa
Part of the exhibition curator’s goal was to challenge preconceived notions of what race is, as well as the idea that it’s definable, that it even exists.
Posted inArt
Art in Odd Places Revisits a Decade of Fleeting Experiences
People who encountered a vending machine dispensing free compliments in the Meatpacking District or a group of women knitting and unraveling white aprons in Union Square over the weekend might have considered them part of New York City’s continually anomalous street life, or felt an odd pang of déjà vu.
Posted inArt
Hank Willis Thomas Seeks the Truth
“The truth is I love you,” reads the sign as you enter Brooklyn’s MetroTech Commons — not a bad way to pique the interest of passersby, appealing to their vanities and insecurities.
Posted inArt
The Digital Lives of Public Art Considered in City Hall Park
Digital artifacts manifested as public sculpture populate the Public Art Fund’s Image Objects in Lower Manhattan’s City Hall Park.
Posted inArt
The (Un)Changing Portrayal of White Women in 100 Years of Advertisements
The idea is so ingenious, it almost seems obvious: take advertisements and remove the text that makes them so, leaving only a string of images behind.
Posted inArt
Celebrating Photographers of Color and the Collectives That Have Nurtured Them
“And who else is there?” A staff member at a well-known photo festival and I were nearing the end of an awkward conversation.
Posted inArt
After a Call for Change, Artists Respond
What kind of painting do you make in the face of the killing of an unarmed civilian by a police officer? What type of drawing sums up the pain of more than a century of institutional racism?