SEDITION
Curated by Dread Scott, Kyle Goen and Hajarah Abdus-Sabur
Exhibition on View:
October 29th - November 23, 2008
Opening Reception:
Wednesday October 29th, 6-9pm
Naeem Mohaiemen, Didn't Want To Sit Anyway
Artists: Melanie Baker,
Wafaa Bilal, Sandow Birk, Emily Douglas, Hasan Elahi, Mounir
Fatmi, Jon Hendricks, Arnold Mesches, Naeem Mohaiemen, Sheryl
Oring, Jenny Polak, Martha Rosler, Jackie Salloum, Hank Willis
Thomas and Raphael Zollinger
When the President of the United States says, “You’re
either with us or you’re with the terrorists”, Sedition
is the only option. In an era of war, lies and torture, Sedition
is the only option. When Black people are left
to suffer and die in a flooded city, when cops fire fifty shots
at an unarmed person and are later found inculpable, when nooses
are hanging in Jena, Louisiana, Sedition
is the only option. Empires demand Sedition*.
Sedition will reveal art about the tumultuous
times we are living in. Following the rich history of art that
challenges dominant ways of seeing, Sedition
will show work that has been under fire and art that is firing
its own ammo. Work such as Hank Willis Thomas’s Hang
Time (Circa 1923), which features the “Air Jordan”
logo hanging from a noose on a tree, encourages viewers to contemplate
how systemic violence against African-Americans has set the
stage for the persistence of racism. Wafaa Bilal’s Virtual
Jihadi is an interactive video game in which an avatar
becomes a suicide bomber in a hunt for President Bush. Jenny
Polak’s ICE raid tracking uses Google Maps to
document and trace Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
raids on the undocumented throughout the U.S.
This show will pull no punches. When the theater is on fire,
we are obligated to scream. Many artists are making challenging
work that is commensurate with the times. Some have been critically
engaged for decades. This show will bring together an unexpected
mix—artists who often would not be thought of as working
in the same framework. What do an American feminist painter
who gained prominence in the 1960s and a 21st century Bangladeshi
new media artist who looks at surveillance have in common? Or
what does an artist who uses the appropriation of the language
of advertising to explore blackness have to do with an artist
who utilizes conceptual strategies to address US wars? We say,
lots.
For more information please contact Deven
Marriner at operations@whiteboxny.org
*Sedition \si-di-shen\ noun:
conduct or language inciting rebellion against the authority
of a state
– American Heritage Dictionary
|
