Confetti Moment: April 2013

Sunday, April 28, 2013

Friday, April 26, 2013

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Just A Few Days Left: Blues for Smoke @ the Whitney

Beauford Delaney Portrait of a Young Musician; Acrylic on canvas.

     Blues for Smoke is an interdisciplinary exhibition that explores a wide range of contemporary art through the lens of the blues and blues aesthetics. Turning to the blues not simply as a musical category but as a field of artistic sensibilities and cultural idioms, the exhibition features works by over forty artists from the 1950s to the present, as well as materials culled from music and popular entertainment.

     The exhibition’s title is drawn from a 1960 solo album by virtuoso jazz pianist Jaki Byard in which improvisation on blues form becomes a basis for avant-garde exploration. The title suggests that the expanded poetics of the blues is pervasive—but also diffuse and difficult to pin down. By presenting an uncommon heterogeneity of subject matter, art historical contexts, formal and conceptual inclinations, genres and disciplines, Blues for Smoke holds artists and art worlds together that are often kept apart, within and across lines of race, generation, and canon.

     A series of performances, events, screenings, and readings will accompany the exhibition.

     Blues for Smoke is organized by The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. The exhibition is curated by Bennett Simpson. At the Whitney Museum, the installation is overseen by Chrissie Iles, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Curator.

Reposted from http://whitney.org/Exhibitions/BluesForSmoke

Thursday, April 18, 2013

‘Mahogany’ Remake: Who Should Replace Diana Ross?

Diana Ross in ‘Mahogany’ (1975)

A remake of the 1975 cult classic Mahogany is reportedly in the works, according to BET.

The iconic movie starred legendary diva Diana Ross as Tracy, a Chicago native who dreams of becoming a fashion designer.

Tracy eventually realizes her dreams and relocates to Rome, where she struggles to balance her relationship with a hometown boyfriend Brian (played by Billy Dee Williams) and her skyrocketing career.

Suzanne de Passe, a longtime Motown executive and producer, will be resurrecting the film which was originally directed by Berry Gordy.

Who do you think would best fill Ross’s designer shoes?

See our slideshow of candidates and tell us who you think should take on the role in this iconic movie.

Follow Lilly Workneh @Lilly_Works

50 Years of Ebony Fashion Fair

From NBC Chicago:

During the 1950s and 1960s, the Ebony Fashion Fair exposed black American audiences to some of the most cutting edge couture fashions in the world.

But the reason the shows were able to attract such quality was because of Eunice W. Johnson, the wife of John Johnson, who was the head of Johnson Publishing Company.

Mrs. Johnson regularly traveled to Europe and purchased couture from the top fashion houses in Europe.

“On the runways, what you saw was her vision of what was fashionable and what was stylish,” curator Joy Bivins said. “In the late 1950s, when these black people showed up in Europe to purchase these garments, it wasn’t always an easy thing to get their foot in the door. They didn’t have the history, they didn’t know who we were, what Ebony was.”

They amassed thousands of ensembles, some of which will be on display at the Chicago History Museum’s newest exhibition “Inspiring Beauty: 50 Years of Ebony Fashion Fair.”