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| detail from The Garden, 2015 |
No Such Place: Contemporary African Artists in America
Curated by Larry Ossei-Mensah & Dexter Wimberly
Opening Reception: February 26, Thursday, 6-8pm
Edward Tyler Nahem Gallery
37 West 57th Street, NY
February 26-April 3, 2015
featuring: ruby onyinyechi amanze, Modou Dieng, Brendan Fernandes, Derek Fordjour, SherinGuirguis, Vivienne Koorland, Wura-Natasha Ogunji, and AdejokeTugbiyele
Edward Tyler Nahem Fine Art announces No Such Place: Contemporary African Artists in America curated by Larry Ossei-Mensah and Dexter Wimberly, a group exhibition that highlights recent work by nine contemporary African artists living and working in the United States.
The exhibition’s curators, Larry Ossei-Mensah and Dexter Wimberly, seek to initiate a nuanced discussion about "Africaness" in the context of contemporary culture. By including multi-generational artists from African countries as varied as Egypt, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, and Zimbabwe, they seek to further debunk the idea of Africa as a singular, monolithic "place". The exhibition highlights artists who express cultural duality and punctuates the complexities of African identity.
In stating, "There is no such thing as contemporary African art – there is only contemporary art from Africa,” Bisi Silva, independent curator and founder/director of the Centre for Contemporary Art in Lagos, Nigeria warns against generic geographical descriptions of art from a continent that is so vast and diverse. Taking a cue from Silva’s significant statement, No Such Place investigates the overlapping signifiers and great diversity present in these particular artists’ work, providing a space that fosters a broader dialogue about culture, aesthetics, religion and politics. No Such Place dives into artistic intuition, exploring how these nine artists process identity and represent their individual points of view.
According to Nahem "There is a new and talented wave of artists emanating from all corners of the rich cultural tapestry known as Africa. We are excited to share in this exploration of contemporary work from a small group of artists from the diaspora, whose diversity lends itself to age, gender, roots and geography. Their new world is ideally one that opens us up to our own concept of the newness of Africa today. We are excited to provide such a forum and hopefully to be a meeting ground and catalyst for its growth and dissemination."
* * *
Edward Tyler Nahem Fine Art announces No Such Place: Contemporary African Artists in America curated by Larry Ossei-Mensah and Dexter Wimberly, a group exhibition that highlights recent work by nine contemporary African artists living and working in the United States.
The exhibition’s curators, Larry Ossei-Mensah and Dexter Wimberly, seek to initiate a nuanced discussion about "Africaness" in the context of contemporary culture. By including multi-generational artists from African countries as varied as Egypt, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, and Zimbabwe, they seek to further debunk the idea of Africa as a singular, monolithic "place". The exhibition highlights artists who express cultural duality and punctuates the complexities of African identity.
In stating, "There is no such thing as contemporary African art – there is only contemporary art from Africa,” Bisi Silva, independent curator and founder/director of the Centre for Contemporary Art in Lagos, Nigeria warns against generic geographical descriptions of art from a continent that is so vast and diverse. Taking a cue from Silva’s significant statement, No Such Place investigates the overlapping signifiers and great diversity present in these particular artists’ work, providing a space that fosters a broader dialogue about culture, aesthetics, religion and politics. No Such Place dives into artistic intuition, exploring how these nine artists process identity and represent their individual points of view.
According to Nahem "There is a new and talented wave of artists emanating from all corners of the rich cultural tapestry known as Africa. We are excited to share in this exploration of contemporary work from a small group of artists from the diaspora, whose diversity lends itself to age, gender, roots and geography. Their new world is ideally one that opens us up to our own concept of the newness of Africa today. We are excited to provide such a forum and hopefully to be a meeting ground and catalyst for its growth and dissemination."
* * *
