Body Parts

New Identities

 

Seattle Art Museum

Beauty and the Beast In An African Parade
Masks from the 1950s
Nigeria, Igbo, Afikpo

There is so much truth in this exhibition, it rises from the ethnological to the universal.

Identities at Play

Seattle Art Museum
Masks from Nigeria Afikpo
Primarily from Mgbom village
Most carved by Chukwu Okoro in the 1950s

 

Every party gathering is a dramatic play in which each participant puts on an alter-identity. This transformation is different from role playing, which involves socially stereotyped functional behaviors. The transformation is a uniquely creative presentation, expressing the private past, subconscious symbolisms and meanings anchored in deep sleep transitions, and personal needs and longings. 

New Identities

 

Seattle Art Museum

Beauty and the Beast In An African Parade
Masks from the 1950s
Nigeria, Igbo, Afikpo

Wearers of the masks take on a new identity for severals days and display their identity in a parade.

 

Dream Car?

 

Seattle Art Museum

Inopportune: Stage One, 2004
Cars and sequenced multi-channel light tubes
Cai Guo-Qiang
Chinese, (works in America), born 1957
each car: 16’ x 6’

Gift of Robert M. Arnold, in honor of the 75th Anniversary of the Seattle Art Museum, 2006.

Guo-Qiang's sequence of cars tumbling through the gallery with radiating tubes of multi-colored light was intended to depict a car exploding. The automobile art object-event was inspired by 9/11 and hence depicts violence. On the other hand, it is possible to shift the context of violence, as I have done in this photograph, to see the cars in different ways. I had originally thought this photo showed the cars as objects of desire (to the wheel chair viewer), emitting the emotions of excitement their ownership and operation offer. A vehicular Chagall concept. Alternatively, we don't know why the wheel chair viewer is confined to a wheel chair. Perhaps the confinement is the result of an auto accident, in which case his initial impression of the exhibition is to evoke a painful memory.

I'm Travelling, Day 4: Homeward Bound at 5:30 AM Sea-Tac Airport Gate D11

 

I'm Travelling, Day 4: Always Reliable Transportation

 

Mr. Bill in fancy harness.

I'm Travelling, Day 3: Forbidden Fruit

 

Mango, Soho, New York City.

I'm Travelling, Day 2: Bright Lights, Big City

 

Chanel, Soho, New York City.

 

I'm Travelling, Day 1: Glamour of Air Travel

Blogging will be sporadic.

 

Ontario, California, Airport

Fitness New York. Central Park