Somewhat Secret Part 2

I still think yes, his materials make him a little bit of an outsider artist in a sense that they are really different but also they have a physicality to them that make him kind of fit in the current conversation weíre having. And sometimes this happens with artists that they are considered outsider and then they move into the fine art realm. But I think this myth of the disabled artist is isolated is ridiculous, especially when they are created. I think it is something that something like this piece can point out. He is remembering this place he grew up; it has a somberness to it; and the more and more you look at it the more and more you get from it. It is definitely communicating something. This is kind of a two-parter. The second curation point has kind of an either-or, or both. I guess if you want... Some people are proving me wrong. Iíve been talking to some artists and this point has been expanded a little bit. So the first two points are primarily for artists with disabilities and the last two points are primarily for artists without disabilities. If somebody fitsÖ Iím just going to have to change. I know that sounds kind of funny. Iím not so cut and dry. I really, Iím a painter for a reason. I like to when in doubt, paint it out. Thatís what I tell my students all the time. Art and literature that discusses or represents the disabled body/mind in subject matter or through artistic practice. So, Iím gunna focus on the subject matter and this idea of vandalized art as having a disabled aesthetic. ... So I met Jonathan Barnbrook, he likes the project. Heís a really nice guy. I went to his lecture, I couldnít quite see his slides, but he was talking about this album, Heathen. Heís primarily a typographer, he does a lot of graphic design for, obviously, David Bowie He was talking about this particular album and it piqued my interest because I had just read an article called Broken Beauty by a disability studies scholar, ... Tobin Siebers. And I thought he needed to read this because he took the idea as being relating to a person who is irreligious and I thought, yes, definitely there is a connection between vandalized image and something irreligious like something being desecrated or changed. And so What I didnít think was emphasized enough in Tobinís discussion was that we look at vandalized images, we look at them not just with the sympathy that we look at a wounded body,we look at them with the sympathy of a wounded soldier or some sort of really cute animal thatís been hurt [laugh]. Like a sheep, like a lamb, something that seems precious. Because it is precious. So what he did is he not only emulated vandalized images, these are all made vandalized images they are emulations of it. He also used text in a very interesting way and referred to the book Sacred Things, you know, British, he is very proud of his relationship to literature. But he also disables the text or disarms it by layering the letterforms in a way that is hard to see. And they are the lyrics from the album. What I find funny is that when I talked to him I said I couldnít really see what you are doing, and I never buy albums because I canít see the inserts. So I thought it was interesting that he makes it hard to see for people with 20/20 vision that it literally messes with the way that you read text. Yeah, so thatís Jonathan Barnbrook, and a small way that something that neverÖ he said to meÖ ìNo one has ever looked at my images and said something to me like that. Thatís very interesting, and I can see how itís true. It makes sense, because of my intimate relationship with images and letter forms. To me they are like really sacred bodies.î So there you go. So um, Art and literature that discusses or represents the disabled body/mind in subject matterÖyou can think of David Bowie now. Or, through artistic practice. Thatís what brings us to Chuck Close; he seems like everybodyís be-all, end-all besides Duffy example of artistic practice that is shaped by disability. But what I think is really important is to understand that he also could very well fit into the way that he thinks of his art into the first category which is just an artist where their work has nothing to do with disability. But just recently he has kind of really come out to say this more frankly, that he has a learning disability where he does not recognize faces. Heís face blind. So, what he does is he deconstructs the image and what he says is he can memorize somebodyís face if he deconstructs the photograph into grid, and then paints the individual little shapes. And these have been recently, this style, that heís doing in 2002, the Emma, the one that we see back here to the right, Emma, which is a face of a child. Kind of with a gaping look, excited maybe. ... What we see is that heís memorizing his nieceís face. Like somebody he cares about thatís really close to him. The side effect of the painting is that. Itís not the goal. Itís not the drive. But it certainly has formed what he paints. This is all he paints, is people, thatís it. Big paintings of peoplesí facesÖ how has this not been party of the conversation for thirty years of his career? I don't know. [inaudible] Yes, face blindness is predominantly from birth. For him, it is from birth. Itís interesting to note is also how peoplesí disabilities, those of very famous artists, are always misrecorded. There is a pretty famous book that came out about the disabled body in art represented in art this year, as well as Tobin Siebersí Disability Aesthetics. She says on the first page that Frida Kahlo had polio. Frida Kahlo had a genetic disorder. She had spina bifida. So, there was a stigma, the idea that this could carry through her family, so they wanted to say she had polio, a disease, versus something that was inherited. So thereís a little tug and pull there. I find it interesting that one disability studies scholar would focus on that whereas another one that wants to talk about art doesnít have exactly quite enough backing to discuss that whereas one that was really interested in how medical diagnoses are talked about in general, brings up an artist then someone who is talking about an artist and trying to make a point about wounds and paintings they donít have the correct information. Partly firsthand sources are so obscured because of the system of repression 0:08:48.250,0:08:49.440 that itís really hard to find what the truth is. ... ... And so thatís also why again I want to respect peoplesí disability identities and if they so choose to say, because I really want to create a firsthand source that is a good source 50 years from now. Does that answer your question? [inaudible]ÖGreat. So 3, Art and literature that isÖ.Oh my God, Iím not even looking at the time. Am I doing good? Ok, weíre good. So, 3: Art and literature that is by artists both with and without disabilities that discusses or represents disability pride or disability culture. This is a really complicated thing because Iíve noticed that some very new disability artists call themselves disability artists without regard for what that means. ... They kind of want to make the definition when the definition has already been kind of made for them through the art world. Already. Really the definition is it kind of has an association with the experience and itís really disability pride art. ... Which doesnít necessarily mean it needs to be happy art. Iím going to show you an example that I would say is pretty happy and pretty direct on what this is. Itís a piece of performance art, so Iíve shown you some drawing, some design, some painting, and now performance. So. Heís also a writer. Heís primarily a poet, made this into a monologue. What it is is an autobiographical poetry monologue about how he became blind and what it is to be an African American man in the United States and what it is to be an African American man who is blind. I tried to contact him and get him to send me a picture doing his cane walk which sounded so amazing because I do not walk very classy with my cane. He has rhythm he says in his little poem so he can tap here and tap there and his hips sway and I thought that was pretty awesome. This from the portion of Weights where he is talking about his body and fighting. It does have a lot of violence in it. Itís not all sunshine. He talks about how he became blind, which was he was shot by another black man who felt disgraced by him. Who, interestingly enough, probably had some sort of mental illness. So he was disabled by somebody with a disability, and the intersection was race. So seeing all these things combined, I think is something weíve been able to do is to see disability art really well and expand what disability culture art is, disability studies has used it to see where they can go. But I think it also gives us license in our analysis for the purpose of the book and the exhibition, to keep gender, sex, all types of identity intertwined. Because they do intertwine and they do affect how art is made, what drives, and what is produced. In this case, our third point shows us how disability can produce an object. I just want to also say that I see a lot of great disability pride art by artists without disabilities. That I think needs to be brought more to the forefront and actually talked about as such, because it isnít talked about that way. ... I wish I could have had time to find you a really good example of that to show you, but I think if you look around you can see what Iím seeing too. The walk, Iíve just got to say, was so cool and also just to say I got shot, Iím fine, I want to go through rehab. And they wouldnít teach him. Then he owned this walk that he taught himself; I think is huge. I wish I was that savvy with my cane [laugh]. ... So Art and literature by artists without disabilities that discusses or represents the sociopolitical nature of disability in contemporary culture and/or utilizes cultural artifacts of disability culture. All right... So what the heck do I mean? Does anybody have any ideas? Yeah, itís confusing. So Iíll give you a hint. sAnn Hamilton in her piece Myein that was in the Venus biennial, 1999. ... Again, very well with Lynn Manningís because it had to do with race. ... She had this building make an installation in. A very large-scale building. Her installations are thought to be very intimate but large scale. She is one of those people that has really expanded contemporary art and its understanding of what it is to make an alternative environment, an installation artist she is; truly good at what she does. ... So it is Monticello. It is the Monticello which is Jeffersonís house and it was in Italy.