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Promise, Witness, Remembrance. Speed Museum. Louisville, Kentucky

Sam Gilliam’s Carousel Form II (1969) and Alisha Wormsley’s afro-futurist manifesto, “There are Black people in the Future,” announce their presence as you walk into the first gallery of Promise, Witness, Remembrance. Gilliam’s Carousel hovers. It is a monolith of canvas, pigment, and pure zeal. Promise, Witness, Remembrance at the Speed Art Museum “reflects on the […]

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Q&A: Kiah Celeste and Material Agency

The study of aesthetic materialism–visually studying raw material for its own ability to be ‘beautiful’–has often had some problematic connotations for me. The ability to strictly utilize specific materials because of their aesthetic power sometimes feels like a superpower: a skill in rationalizing pulling yourself out of the trauma of human history in order to […]

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Tala Madani and her Théâtre de la Cruauté in Projections

At a whopping eight feet wide and predominately a Mars Black that tempers into the Payne’s Gray realm, Projections (2015) presents itself (similarly to all of Madani’s paintings, animations, drawings and music) as a viscus and intuitive—quick or even hasty— figurative narrative depicting male figures participating in some sort of tragic comedy.  Carbon Black lines […]

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The Double Standard and The Drawing Room within Perrotin A Quick Examination of Genesis Belanger & Emily Mae Smith

I’m going to discuss one image—with works from two female-identifying artists. The image is taken by an anonymous photographer that documented the two-person exhibition A Strange Relative at Perrotin New York in late 2018. The exhibition, a two-person dialogue between Brooklyn-based ceramicist Genesis Belanger and painter Emily Mae Smith is described by Perrotin as two […]

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ALL THINGS ARE DELICATELY INTERCONNECTED: Jenny Holzer // Wanda Orme Earth Day and COVID-19

There are / were a lot of holidays effected by COVID-19 measures this spring; Ramadan, Passover, and Easter to name the heavyweights. For me what stood with a heavier weight than normal was Earth Day. Every year on April 22, we celebrate the beginning of what is now known as the official beginning of the […]

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Your Past Needs You: “Cat Mummies Came First” at Sheherazade

In mid February I had read Alex Greenberger’s overview of several New York Museum exhibitions that all mirrored the strained sensation that is overwhelmingly pervasive at the moment.[1] In it, Greenberger covers Rachel Harrison’s mid-career survey, Life Hack, at the Whitney and makes the observation that Harrison taps into our contemporary media overload: . . […]

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“We Don’t Have Anesthesia But We Have Music. . .” Feras Fayyad’s “The Cave” (2019) at Speed Museum Cinema

There is tragedy in losing control where control has been sought as a defense.  “The Cave” of the title is the nickname for an underground hospital in Ghouta, a district not far outside of the Syrian capital of Damascus. Ghouta has been a flashpoint of violence during the seemingly endless Syrian civil war.  “Underground” works […]

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September Diencephalon at Institute 193

“I thought, maybe you have to choose between happiness and truth and that is when I had my five imaginary children and I became happy.” And Other Self-Affirming Quasi-Truths by September Diencephalon at Institute 193. Before making my drive to Lexington to see September Diencephalon’s exhibition, Children Dance on Water I Wonder Why They Wash […]

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Letitia Quesenberry at Quappi Projects (((heat))) Louisville, Kentucky August 2nd – September 6th, 2019

Even the title of Letitia Quesenberry’s latest exhibition (((heat))) imitates her multiple approaches to creating glow.Through her adaptions of electric current, neon, lacquers and resins; Quesenberry reveals the multiplicity of truth through our evaluation of or understanding of visual or memorized perception using various approaches to abstraction as they relate to Op Art amongst others. […]

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Conspiratorial Aesthetics at the Cressman Center for Visual Arts: Why does so much new art look conspiratorial?

“Why does so much new art look conspiratorial?” In preparation for attending Conspiratorial Aesthetics at the Cressman Center for Visual Arts I read the curatorial statement. In it the curator, Christopher Reitz, asks the question above. And it’s all I can remember of the statement. Why does so much new art look conspiratorial? Why does […]

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Picasso to Pollock: Modern Masterworks from the Eskenazi Museum of Art at Indiana University at the Speed Art Museum

According to the Speed Art Museum, Picasso to Pollock: Modern Masterworks from the Eskenazi Museum of Art showcases the impressive early 20th-century art collection owned by the Eskenazi Museum of Art at Indiana University. It covers the breadth of nearly every major artistic movement that occurred between the years 1900 and 1950 in Europe and America. […]

Read | Comments Off on Picasso to Pollock: Modern Masterworks from the Eskenazi Museum of Art at Indiana University at the Speed Art Museum | Tags: * · December 2018

Keltie Ferris: *O*P*E*N* at the Speed Art Museum: Casualist Painting / Not-cAsual SetTing

When I was an undergrad I fumbled into Sharon Butler’s essay “The New Casualists” published in “The Brooklyn Rail”. I found it at a crucial moment in my development as a painter. It was 2011 and I was searching for a reason to keep painting. I had recently discovered the depth and breadth to which […]

Read | Comments Off on Keltie Ferris: *O*P*E*N* at the Speed Art Museum: Casualist Painting / Not-cAsual SetTing | Tags: * · November 2018

donottellmewhereibelong: drawing and sculpture by Joan Tanner Curated by Julien Robson Cressman Center for Visual Arts / Hite Art Institute / Department of Fine Arts / University of Louisville

“A curiosity to engage contradiction…might be kindled from memories of listening to my father talk about the perils and challenges in practicing medicine…Disease. Malady. Disfigurement. Imperfection. Structural weakness. I probably did not realize then, but I was already hooked.”  —Joan Tanner, Interview with In the Make: Interviews with West Coasts Artists, June 2014. Joan Tanner’s […]

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Benjamin Cook: History Abridged at Swanson Contemporary, Louisville, Kentucky August 15th – September 22nd

Currently situated within Swanson Contemporary are paintings and installations composed of paintings situated within murals that make up Benjamin Cook’s exhibition, History Abridged—they’re fun, they’re difficult, they’re comedic, and they’re nostalgic. The show could easily feel overworked with this much imagery—but it doesn’t. It references a certain conflicting brevity of time and expansion of time […]

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Artist Interview for Aeqai: Megan Bickel interviews Photographer, Bill Daniel

“In a sense it’s just ridiculously irresponsible to try to work as an artist.”   —Bill Daniels  If you were shuffling around the Portland neighborhood in Louisville, Kentucky during the first week of June, you heard rumbles that an artist by the name of Bill Daniels was going to steamroll through with a one-night, bombastic, fully […]

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KMAC Couture: Art Walks the Runway: An Interview with designers Liz Richter and Lilly Kass

I was fortunate enough to be asked by Mentor Coordinator, Melanie Miller (Hyland Glass, Hyland Gallery) to participate as an artist mentor for 2018 KMAC Couture: Art Walks the Runway, as well as given the opportunity by aeqai to visit the show—which is as close to high fashion as Kentucky is going to get. Couture […]

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Critical Mass II // Critical Discourse and Engagement in Kentucky

Critical Mass II was the second in a series of panel discussions around various urban centers within Kentucky. This particular installment was arranged by the Kentucky Museum of Art & Craft, in collaboration with UnderMain, Inc. and arranged in partnership with the The Great Meadows Foundation. This panel discussion focused on critical thinking in the […]

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Sweet Dreams // Sheherazade // Louisville KY

“I’m always looking for relationships between my existence and total existence, connections between here and elsewhere”. -Mariko Mori Yoko Molotov is recognized locally as a rather prolific artist whose confessional, dystopian, and gender-fluid drawings are a recognizable feature of Louisville’s online landscape. Typically pulling from irony, humor, horror, and kawaii, Molotov typically creates cartoonish narratives […]

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Nick Cave: FEAT. // The Frist Center for Visual Art // Nashville, Tennesse

My visit to Nashville in December brought me to the Frist Center for the Visual Arts for the first time since its opening in April of 2001. If you’re unfamiliar, the Frist Center inhabits one of Nashville’s historic landmarks,  the former main post office built in the early 1930’s. The building is a quite striking […]

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A Brief Elaboration of a Tube: Letita Quesenberry and Aaron Rosenblum at Huff Gallery (Spalding University)

A Brief Elaboration of a Tube is equal parts local soundscape fiction and monument to reflection and introspection. Huff Gallery is located in the basement of the library of Spalding University (Louisville, Kentucky); a suitable location for an installation as subversive and introspective as this. As the viewer enters the space from the main stairwell, […]

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BRUCE CONNER: FOREVER AND EVER // Speed Art Museum

BRUCE CONNER: FOREVER AND EVER presents a selection of films and works on paper by the experimental and breakthrough artist Bruce Conner (1933-2008). The exhibition was organized after a recent gift of twenty-one lithographs was presented to the Speed Art Museum by the Conner Family Trust. In conjunction with the exhibition of lithographs,  two recent […]

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Failure in Progress // Zephyr Gallery

In 2014, Zephyr launched an ongoing Project series with curated proposal-based exhibitions as well as collaborations with universities, colleges, and cultural institutions. Project 20: Failure in Progress is the twentieth exhibition in this series. Failure in Progress is curated by Jessica Bennet Kincaid, currently the Coordinator of Collections and Exhibitions at the University of Louisville’s […]

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Team B Architecture and Design

Editor’s Note:  Aeqai is pleased to republish Megan Bickel’s interview with Team B  The inverview was originally published on Five-Dots. Team B Architecture & Design (made up of David Corns, Anna Kerr, Quinn Kummer, and John Stoughton) is a full-service studio located in Over-the-Rhine exploring the way in which form, space, and material can communicate […]

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Gibbs Rounsavall

Editor’s Note:  Aeqai is pleased to republish Megan Bickel’s interview with Gibbs Rounsavall. The interview was originally published on Five-Dots. Gibbs Rounsavall compares his studio practice to that of a scientific exploration embracing the thrill of discovery. The focus of his study has primarily been on relationships between shape and color. One of his bedrock […]

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Joyce Garner, cul-de-sac at Garner Narrative Contemporary Fine Art Louisville, Kentucky

Garner Narrative currently has a group of paintings by the gallery’s owner, Joyce Garner. Garner’s paintings about family, currently installed at Garner Narrative in Louisville Kentucky until December 29th, couldn’t come at a more seasonally appropriate time. Walking into Garner Narrative the viewer is met with the gigantic six yard wide loose stretched canvas, yellow […]

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Paul Mpagi Sepuya: Portraits / Positions In Conjunction with the Louisville Biennial

Paul Mpagi Sepuya was born in San Bernardino, California in 1982. He currently lives and works in Los Angeles. Sepuya is known for his extensive photographs of domesticated scenes of friends, fellow artists, and lovers. His photographs vary anywhere from portraiture and figure studies to photographs of collaged elements from previous studies that have been […]

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Sarah Martin: Expectations at The McGrath Gallery at Bellarmine University

As a preface, I’m writing this piece whilst questioning my intent in writing it. This exhibition had some serious flaws. On one hand, Expectations was presented like a body of student work, t-pinned artist statements printed on printer paper and all; and the gallery wasn’t big enough for two collections of work, let alone two […]

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Poetry in Bars and Other Solutions

“The spirit of Dada re-emerges in the puberty of every artistic generation,” —Adrian Notz (owner / operator of the Cabarete Voltaire)     Believing that painting had become too concerned with pleasing the eye and not the mind, Marcel Duchamp had the idea to fasten a bicycle wheel to a kitchen stool and watch it […]

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99 Cents or Less // MOCAD

It’s such a shame when bad exhibitions happen in great museums. I have a fondness for the Museum of Contemporary Art in Detroit. If you aren’t familiar, the MOCAD is a 22,000 square foot space that was built, or rather assembled, in the early 2000’s within the walls of an old car dealership—a poetic placement […]

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Southern Elegy: The Stephen Reily Collection // Speed Museum at University of Louisville

Southern Elegy: Photography from the Stephen Reily Collection is a small exhibition in the North Building of the Speed Museum, and includes some black and white photographs by William Eggleston. If you choose to walk up the intrinsically modern stairway of the Speed, Southern Elegy is the first exhibition you approach as a viewer.  It […]

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Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft // The Drawing Center: “Thread Lines”

This group exhibition features fifteen artists who utilize sewing, knitting, and weaving to create a wide-range of works that activate the expressive and conceptual potential of line and illuminate affinities between the mediums of textile and drawing. Multi-generational and international in scope, Thread Lines brings together those pioneers who—challenging entrenched modernist hierarchies—first unraveled the distinction […]

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Maxime Van Melkebeke

 This article is reproduced courtesy of Five-Dots and all images are courtesy of Maxime Van Melkeke. For this edition of Five-Dots, Megan got to chat with Maxime Van Melkebeke via email coorespondance over the past two months about his project Offspace.xyz. We won’t waste our breath divulging how great it was of an experience, we’ll […]

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Zephyr Gallery: Project 17: Ritual Geography

Zephyr Gallery has a twenty year history in Louisville, moving from location to location as the community needs and sees fit. Project 17: Ritual Geography is part of an ongoing project started in 2014 by Zephyr. Their ongoing Project series is made up of curated proposal-based exhibitions as well as collaborations with universities, colleges, and […]

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KMAC Couture: Art Walks the Runway; Louisville’s soiree into the couture fashion world

The Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft has been a part of the Louisville arts community since 1989 (formally the Art and Craft Foundation). Since its opening at its current location in 2001, the KMAC has created exhibitions, educational, and academic programming for the community in which it is sited. The KMAC Couture Fashion Show […]

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Fern Canyon: Paintings by Claire Sherman at the KMAC

The day that I visited the Kentucky Museum of Arts and Crafts on Main Street, the sun was shining through their gigantic windows facing out onto Museum Row; and the museum was abuzz with people getting ready for the KMAC Couture Fashion Show. Claire Sherman’s work was being shown on the third floor gallery which […]

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Painting in the Network: Algorithm and Appropriation at University of Louisville’s Cressman Center for the Arts

Painting in the Network: Algorithm and Appropriation, which is currently up at University of Louisville’s Cressman Center for the Arts, and curated by Chris Reitz, is involved in a dialogue that has been unwrapping itself for just about forty years (and arguably since the advent of photography): how does new media (in all of its […]

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Paige Williams

Editor’s Note:  Aeqai is pleased to republish Megan Bickel’s interview with Paige Williams.  The inverview was originally published on Five-Dots. Paige Williams has exhibited in Germany, the Ukraine, Chicago, Los Angeles and New York and has been selected as an Artist in Residence at the Millay Colony for the Arts in New York, The University of […]

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Anne Wehrley Bjork at B. Deemer Gallery, Louisville, Kentucky.

Anne Bjork, an artist whose work I was unfamiliar with until visiting the gallery; is originally from New Mexico and now resides in and is a part of the adjunct faculty in University of Kentucky’s Fine Art Department. Bjork’s work intends to ‘capture the essence of mystical ruins of the ancient Anasazi pueblos in her […]

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