EXHIBITIONS 2009

Past Exhibitions 2010 | 2008 | 2007-2006 | 2005-2003

 

ESCAPE: Work by Fritz Ducheine

June 2 through August 2

The Museum of the National Center of Afro-American Artists, in cooperation with the PeaceWork Gallery, is pleased to present ESCAPE: Works by Fritz Ducheine. The exhibition is partially supported by a grant from the Puffin Foundation.

ESCAPE presents works created by Fritz Ducheine over the last decade in response to violence in society and the need for hope. Since coming to the United States in the early l980s, Ducheine’s work has grown more preoccupied with socio-political issues haunted by a spirituality that a Vermont critic called “dark and anguished” or “brooding despite a reliance on primary colors”.

In the seven works in ESCAPE, he has favored blues and grays enlivened with red and occasionally white paints. The reds obviously signify blood while the washes of blue and gray sometimes thinly shield figures associated with death or religion. Voudou references frequently occur alone, or in combination with Christian icons.

Ducheine’s titles frame content, deepen philosophical reflection, and sometimes recall recent historical events. Ground Zero, for example, refers to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The horrible days of Kosovo comments on the turmoil in Eastern Europe in the wake of the collapse of Yugoslavia in the l990s. Hope in a wounded world and Sacrifice express Ducheine’s belief that religious faith can point the way toward hope after tragic events. Legba’s manifestation sets forth multiple views on the way forward. In Voudou tradition, this loa or deity sought to bring together the spirits of the Amerindians and Africans thereby metaphorically uniting the spiritual old and new worlds. Legba still remains the guardian of the gateway between devotees and the loas. Crossroads remain a favorite site for him since crossroads are places of danger where tricksters frolic and where the wrong path can be easily taken.

In Judgment Day, Ducheine calls attention to human accountability for personal and social actions.  Though the Christian concept of Judgment is referenced, the notion that life should be lead within moral constraints is universal, and associated with spiritual reckoning.
Fritz, an introductory video shot and edited by Zeen Rachidi and produced by PeaceWork Gallery in Newton, Massachusetts, accompanies the exhibition.

Fritz Ducheine, born in Plaisance in northern Haiti and educated at the Lycee Geffrard in Gonaives, is a self-taught painter who has made art since his teen years. As a teenager, he was deeply influenced by the visual artists in Haiti, and spent much time observing and studying them. Initially, he was attracted to subjects drawn from nature and the daily life of Haitians, but in time his interest shifted toward highly imaginative almost surreal explorations of the spiritual symbolism of Haiti. Over the last decade, he has focused strongly on themes of peace and social healing.

Ducheine relates, “Since my childhood, I had an intense feeling for colors.” He saw himself as a child of “La Grande Famille de l’art”.  Themes of nature dominated his early work, leading him to eventually conclude that his “love of Nature included [his] love of humanity”, This lesson strengthened his resolve to fight ignorance, violence and exploitation, and his mission became trying to “understand and establish the rapport that holds Nature and mankind together”.

Fritz Ducheine is a member of the Haitian National Arts Assembly of Massachusetts, and he has has exhibited widely throughout New England. He has also been the subject of numerous articles and television shows both about his own work, as well as about the culture of Haiti.

UBUNTU Quilt and Story Circle

June 2 through August 2

The Museum of the National Center of Afro-American Artists is pleased to present the UBUNTU Quilt and Story Circle, visual arts projects of Artistic Noise. Both works were created by young women in detention under the direction of Artistic Noise.

The UBUNTU Quilt is a story quilt featuring embroidered images within a decorative grid and border. The source material for the quilt came from drawings and paintings of ancient and contemporary masks and heads, with special attention given to hair and braiding coiffures. Hair braiding is a favorite weekend activity for girls in detention, and relates to their sense of beauty, sisterhood and friendship.
It is also a perfect metaphor for the UBUNTU philosophy that was imparted to them, because the ancient art of hair braiding is an intimate yet communal expression of caring.

The project concept was collaboratively developed with Diana Gomez and Ann Tobey. UBUNTU (a Bantu word) expresses an African philosophy, which holds that “a person is a person through other persons”, that we are all interconnected and interdependent. It seeks to engender a spirit of mutual support and the principle of caring for each other’s well being. UBUNTU promotes understanding, kindness, compassion and the belief that we share responsibility for each other. It was a crucial concept in the formation of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

Story Quilt is a sculptural installation of cast feet and ankles arranged in a tight circle and accompanied by a sound track of the girls conversing with each other. To realize the project, the participants made plaster castings of their feet over which they created papier-mâché renderings. This process allowed for individualizing the feet and for giving them color. By assembling these sculptures toe to toe on a circular carpet, they evoke a sense of community and closeness.

The sound track heard over the installation consists of songs, poems, and informal exchanges. It was not organized around specific questions or theme, but rather was intended to have the flexibility of chats between friends. It offers insights into the experiences that they have chosen to share with each other, and with the viewers.

Artistic Noise is an arts program for youth thirteen to eighteen in the juvenile justice system. It provides opportunities for participants to grow in their human development through the visual arts while learning usable skills. Through visual autobiography, exhibitions and marketing, young people discover how to follow complex projects through to completion, express themselves through visual media, and take part in collaborative projects with their peers and teachers.

By working with youth both inside the detention facility and back in the community, Artistic Noise provides continuity for youth who are often experiencing trauma and upheaval in their lives. The program’s flexible structure gives job training to teenagers who may lack the emotional maturity or skills to succeed in standard employment training or job situations.

Formerly H.U.M.A.N. (Hear Us Make Artistic Noise) founded in Boston in 2001 under the umbrella of the Juvenile Rights Advocacy Program at Boston College, Artistic Noise has recently become an independent organization with a mission to serve youth in the justice system locally and nationally.

Violence Transformed: Two Critical Views

Phillip Harvey, Editor of the online journal Nat Creole, and painter Cullen Washington select contemporary works that examine how artists from many cultural traditions represent narratives of transformation provoked by violence. The exhibition is part of the larger multi-institutional Violence Transformed collaboration that uses art to address and mediate violence and to promote social healing.

Learn more about Violence Transformed at www.violencetransformed.com.

View selections from Violence Transformed exhibition

View  GENESIS: Works by Freddie Cabral
Painter / Sculptor / Architect

No theme has occupied Freddie Cabral more than genesis, the process by which things come into being. In his drawings, he sometimes suggests evolutionary forms transforming from one shape to another and becoming recognizable animals along the way. In others, his twisting bands of pattern often suggest momentarily torsos, cavities and other echoes of bodily forms.

The process of becoming is clearly expressed in sculptures where a pearl is born from the irritation of sand, or where a city builds itself into a futuristic tower. The inspiration common to all of his work is a deep awe of the force of creation that infuses all of nature and expresses itself through unending generative revelation.

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