A round-up of staff favorites showcases a wide range of art and artists that resonate with Pride Month.
Dawoud Bey, Irrigation Ditch, 2020
Gallery 374
Dawoud Bey’s photography has always fascinated me, from his street photography to large portraits of fellow artists such as Lorna Simpson, but his more recent forays into landscape photography arguably captivate me more than anything else. These dark, contemplative scenes of American terrain create an undeniable sense of haunting, especially in light of Bey’s work following the paths of the Underground Railroad. Their shadowy depths invite the viewer to look closer, simultaneously pulling them in and bringing forward a sense of the history embedded in the very soil. —Nora Stewart
George Tooker, Coney Island, 1948
Gallery 361
Coney Island in Brooklyn inspired so many artists (the Wadsworth Atheneum did a big exhibition and catalogue in 2015 about this). Many thrilled at the diversity of people, bodies, ages, activities (family-friendly and not!), sights, sounds, smells at the beach. Many used the subject as a means to show a sprawling, overpopulated, cauldron of mayhem. Tooker’s painting contrasts with the others by quietly celebrating the pleasures of being together with friends and family at the beach, using a hushed, loving tone. It still shows the sparks of fun and excitement one would expect, but Tooker also makes the composition seem like a dream or spiritual experience. -Bob Cozzolino
Swoon (Caledonia Curry), Alixa and Naima, 2008
Gallery 374
This piece evokes such beautiful things within me. The intimate moment that we are given access to feels so pure in its sacredness. The joy and serenity that emotes from this artwork is truly felt with every color and texture used. It’s raw and it’s multifaceted, it’s ever-growing in form. It can be interpreted as a moment of genuine expression of love amongst family, friends, and lovers. A love like this feels as if it could transcend the obstacles that come with living and surviving in our current environment. A reminder of how important it is to hold each other both in the best and worst of times. How we can uplift one another with such compassion, understanding, and intention. Utilizing creativity as a mode to continued resistance. Swoon channeled this beautifully! —Johana A. Cornejo Cisneros
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi; Author: Takabatake Ransen; Publisher: Inoue Mohei, I want to cancel my subscription, 1878
Gallery 103
First of all, this piece has a cat just chilling, so that’s always something I appreciate in a piece of art. Then the title itself catches me off guard, because it feels so contemporary (who does not have entirely too many subscriptions they want to cancel?). But the great part of being in a museum is that there’s that extra explanation in the didactic that I never would have known by just looking, and that is that the dual meaning of the title also includes that she wants to “disavow a tryst with a lover that was uncovered.” So with this piece I get to experience both the familiarity of a domestic scene of someone hanging out with their cat, and learn about the history of Japanese newspapers. —Kate Brenner-Adam
Zoe Leonard, I Want a President, 1992/2018
Gallery 369
What she said. —Emily Rosenberg (they/them)
Andrea Carlson; Printer: Highpoint Editions, Minneapolis; Publisher: Highpoint Editions, Minneapolis, Anti-Retro, 2018
Gallery 260
Anti-Retro by Andrea Carlson is a beloved piece of mine given the artist’s connection to the region and local production through the Highpoint Printmaking Center, a place I admire as an artist and a former intern. Carlson’s distinctive mark-making further charged by her active storytelling creates dynamic images for critical reflection on personal and historical pasts. These works challenge one to consider dominant cultures’ depictions of histories specifically through an Indigenous lens. Her imagery utilizes symbols from the past to construct futuristic landscapes that interrogate historical legacies of colonialism, invasion, and conquest within institutional power systems. As a queer person, this resonates deeply as our community’s history has been misconstrued, ignored, and in the current day actively met with violence and discrimination. By exposing fraudulent cultural narratives, Carlson asserts that culture is in a continual state of change and assimilation requiring a reframing of popular (collective) memory. It is the truth that is expressed through exaggeration that strikes something deeply human and beautiful. —Dustin Steuck
Harriete Estel Berman, Eons of Exodus seder plate, 2008
Gallery 362
When we acknowledge and learn from the brutalities in our history, we can reclaim a sense of humanity for ourselves and for future generations.” Harriete Estel Berman wrote these words when she created this sculptural Seder plate titled Eons of Exodus to bring current meaning to the Jewish Passover holiday. I was drawn to this artwork from the moment I saw it. The detail in the powerful silhouettes depicting the original exodus of Jews from Egypt, other images of Jewish emigration over the centuries, and a contemporary scene of African women and children fleeing violence in Darfur, invited me to contemplate the enormity of migration across time and place, and its impact on individuals and masses. But these were not the only difficult histories she addressed. My eye was also drawn to the orange alongside images of traditional Passover foods. This was my introduction to the addition of the orange to modern Seder plates to show support of including queer people as full-fledged participants in Jewish rituals. Why an orange? In the words of Susannah Heschel, professor of Jewish studies at Dartmouth College who introduced this practice, “I chose an orange because it suggests the fruitfulness for all Jews when lesbians and gay men are contributing and active members of Jewish life.” The ritual she created involves Seder participants taking a segment of the orange and saying a blessing over it before eating. Some also spit out the seeds as a rejection of homophobia. Over time a made-up story led to the reinterpretation of Heschel’s idea of the orange as an affirmation of queer people. This posited that a man said to Herschel that a woman belongs on the bimah [podium of a synagogue] as an orange on the Seder plate. Heschel’s response to this claim says it all: “A woman’s words are attributed to a man, and the affirmation of lesbians and gay men is erased. Isn’t that precisely what’s happened over the centuries to women’s ideas?” The orange and its true meaning, however, will never be erased from Berman’s beautiful and powerful Seder plate. —Sheila McGuire