[iDC] Re: Gender, Race, and Ethnicity
Ryan Griffis
ryan.griffis at gmail.com
Tue Apr 18 19:14:30 EDT 2006
i don't have much to add to a discussion of music, i'm afraid... my
music history is very limited, but i have some thoughts generally...
a couple of years ago, i had a conversation with an artist friend of
mine, damali ayo, who was in a show i put together about genetics, and
she talked about the burden of being assumed a representative of some
group, in her case African Americans. while the work she makes is often
about her subjective experience, which includes perceptions of race,
she resented being expected to bring an authoritative "black
perspective" to whatever issue, which reinforces the idea of a white
neutrality. (if you're reading damali, correct me if i'm
misrepresenting you) of course, this isn't new. As Rasheed Araeen
writes,
"The problem here is that racism in the visual arts is camouflaged, so
much so that both its perpetrators and its 'victims' are unaware of its
existence. It is perceived as a benevolent or altruistic act, which is
supposed to empower those who were once denied power. In fact, it does
bestow some with a power, but on a highly selective and discriminatory
basis. When artists from the former colonies arrived in postwar
Britain, some of them were welcomed and celebrated; but only those who
were seen to be representing not only something different from what one
is supposed to do within a modern context but also the cultural roots
of the countries they originated from."
http://www.spiked-online.com/articles/0000000CA421.htm
some other friends of mine in Los Angeles were somewhat troubled by an
article in the LA TImes a while back about "new Chicano" art for which
they were interviewed. Despite the main crux of their statements, that
they weren't "Chicano artists," the article's position was that they
couldn't be anything but Chicano artists, even if their work didn't
look/sound "Chicano." Whatever they're making, it doesn't look like 70s
"Chicano art" so it must be "new Chicano art."
Araeen once wrote about the "coincidental" shift from modernism to pomo
in art discourse at about the same time that post colonial subjects
were starting to become engaged in the discourse to a degree that they
couldn't be ignored any longer. Or as Gerardo Mosquera once wrote (in
an Art Papers from 1997):
"Key categories such as 'appropriation,' 'postnational,' 'decentering,'
... have been used in excessively affirmative ways, without significant
critique of the categories themselves. There is, moreover, an ingenious
tendency to think of globalization in terms of a trans-territorial
world of multidirectional contacts. In reality, the connections arise
from schemata that radiate from axes of power...and under the direction
of 'self-decentered' centers."
The "Race in Digital Space" series seemed a good starting point, but
where do we go from there? these are obviously discussions that go well
beyond the scope of this list, but i think Trebor's right (via Paul's
original provocation), it has to be restated and reevaluated
constantly. As someone who has curated some, i'm wondering what other
people on the list who curate (or have been curated) have to say about
notions of selecting subjectivities as exemplars and how that is or
isn't done based on notions of reified beliefs about race and
authenticity. and, in a larger context, what role does geography play
in this?
best,
ryan
some more reference links for discussion:
Michelle Wright on the "digital divide"
http://switch.sjsu.edu/v6n2/articles/wright.html
Keith Piper, who always seems conspicuously out of new media discussions
http://keithpiper.users.btopenworld.com/menuFrameset.html
an interview with Renee Green, where she briefly talks about
technology, and of course, gets asked about the influence of Adrian
Piper
http://chez.cicv.fr/green_e.htm
Paul Vanouse, well, for bringing up genetics
http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~pv28/
an interview with one of my friends who was interviewed in LA as a "new
chicano artist"
http://www.beyondmainstream.com/archives/arts/artist/
artist_ruben_ochoa.php
one of damali's projects that most people are probably familiar with
http://www.rent-a-negro.com/
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