Now Showing at Sarasota Art Museum, Part 1

 Photo by Campbell Addy

Sarasota Art Museum is my happy place. It's not that the exhibits there always make me smile. In fact, as a contemporary art museum, many exhibits highlight the issues of today's world, which is distinctly not a happy place. But a visit there never fails to make me think and feel. As a docent, I get to walk through the exhibit before it opens with the artist or the curator. And then I get to share what I've learned with other visitors. It is a great gig. 

As of Saturday, the Museum will have five -- yes, five -- exhibits on display. Each is worthy of a blog on its own. But consider these posts a teaser to encourage you to check the exhibits out yourself (or, if that's not geographically convenient, to visit a museum near you). 

"The New Black Vanguard: Photography between Art and Fashion" is an exhibit featuring the work of 15 Black photographers working today. The exhibit's title sets the show up nicely. The word "New" references the fact that these photographers are not the first of their kind. Historically, the fashion world has turned to White Eurocentric men to create the images that stare out at us from newstands and populate those magazines' pages. That's not to say that there haven't been Black photographers working in that arena. Gordon Parks, known for his documentation of the Civil Rights movement, shot some gorgeous fashion photos for Vogue and the like. Click here to see a few of those images. But his work never made it to the cover of those magazines.  

"Late Leisure" by Jamal Nxedlana (2019)

The exhibit includes the work of photographers such as Tyler Mitchell and Dana Scruggs whose work has appeared front and center on magazines that continue to play a role in defining what it means to be beautiful and cool and powerful. And magazine cover or not, each of the image makers in the exhibit has made a significant contribution to the world of photography. Often that's been done through the use of social media, a relatively new phenomenon. And so these photographers are "New." 

Per the Oxford Dictionary, the word "vanguard" means "a group of people leading the way in new developments or ideas." It's the perfect description of the photographers included in the exhibit. Their work is exciting and fresh, and each artist has his or her own unique style. It's an exhibit that requires multiple visits to fully appreciate. So putting it together, "The New Black Vanguard" exhibit showcases Black photographers working in the tradition of their predecessors while charging into the future and leaving their own marks on the world. 

For more on "The New Black Vanguard: Photography between Art and Fashion," click here. The exhibit runs through September 17. 

"Your time zone is in a different destination"
by Stephenie J. Woods (moving audio photograph)

"Stephanie J. Woods: my papa used to play checkers" is an exhibit that is both personal to the artist and relevant to our collective past. Woods was selected to do an artist residency at Black Rock Senegal, a program established by none other than Kehinde Wiley. She arrived in Dakar without a specific project in mind, giving herself the latitude to respond to her environment. The exhibit -- Woods' first museum show -- captures those responses in a powerful way.

As a North Carolina native, Woods has rued what she perceived as a lack of connection with her African roots. But once she was on the ground in Senegal, she realized that those connections do in fact exist. She found them in the food she ate and the games of checkers people played on the streets. (A recessed memory of playing checkers with her grandfather when she was a child led to the title of the exhibit.) And she felt that connection as she stood on the shore of the Atlantic Ocean talking to her mother at home in North Carolina. 

But the exhibit also recalls the harsh reality of her ancestors being enslaved and shipped like animals to the Americas. Goree Island is located a short ferry ride away from Dakar. The Island was home to the House of Slaves with its Door of No Return. Enslaved people awaiting export were housed there. Families were separated, with men in one area, women in another and children in a third. When the time came for their departure from their homeland, they passed through the Door of No Return. That passage signaled the absolute loss of any hope that their lives might return to what they had been. It's heartbreaking to imagine and just one reason why this exhibit is well worth your time.

For more on "Stephanie J. Woods: my papa used to play checkers," click here. That exhibit is also running through September 17.

Next up: "Sara Berman's Closet," "Chakaia Booker: Surface Pressure" and "Reassembling Spilt Light: An Immersive Installation by Carlos Bunga"