Undercurrent Projects

09/18/2021

✍️ "Virtual space increasingly overlaps with our daily realities, most recently with the explosion of NFTs on the art market, shifting ideas of where art is made, collected and exhibited. The metaverse — a term for a fully formed online existence coined by Neal Stephenson in his 1992 sci-fi novel Snow Crash — is now an ubiquitous concept, with virtual reality, augmented reality and other technologies contributing to the expansion of the online world.

Now, the metaverse, and the role that NFTs may have in it, are inspiring artists to examine its strange and powerful possibilities.
…
While the shape of the metaverse and art’s presence in it are evolving, these artists transport viewers into a liminal space between the world we know and the one still being created.”

✍️ Allison C. Meier, Introspective
📸

Meier sat down with almost every artist in Metaglyphs, (there were 10, in 4 time zones!) to create this thoughtful -- and beautifully 📸 -- piece.

01/13/2021

I interviewed Colette for Bomb in 2013, and to me, her influence is more apparent every year. She's the progenitor of Victorian Punk, a woman among boys, the artstar who inspired the rock stars like Madonna and Lady Gaga. She staged her death at the Whitney in 1978, and slept in artspaces decades before Tilda Swindon at MoMA--sometimes n**e, other times: f**k off.

Jeffrey Deitch called that Clocktower exhibition one of the most important, most stimulating exhibits he'd seen in New York.

If you want to own a piece of art history, you can get a Colette original at her Kickstarter (and incidentally, help her keep her legendary living environment, too). I supported. Show this amazing woman some love!

Link to our Bomb talk in my profile, or you can read recent ones in Flaunt and Dazed.

Personal favorite right now: Olympia Practices Being in Two Places at One Time. Her work was considered, at the time, hard to pin down. I'll just say: wow, does this hold up.

Leave a note if you're interested and I'll send you the link to her kickstarter!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/living-environment/save-colettes-legendary-new-york-living-environment/posts/3055878?fbclid=IwAR1RwY3NzKsulsDcrNsPh0NX9XjFV44v0V4xawMTXz6kcHj_vT0zZODNTu8 @ New York, New York

11/20/2020

Join in, tonight at 7pm ET! Zoom link in bio.

“The Confidence Game” a timely online exhibition curated by Savannah Spirit & Joe Nanashe featuring artists Kumasi Barnett, Natalie Baxter, Chris Bors, Eric Doeringer, Carla Gannis, Alex Gingrow, Guerrilla Girls, Tommy Kha, David Kramer, Yuliya Lanina, Morgan Lappin, Lisa Levy, Loz City, Stephen Manka, Ruben Natal-San Miguel, Alexandra Rubinstein, Michael Scoggins, Fabian Tabibian, Tiny Pricks Project, David C. Terry, Milan Tiff, Spencer Tunick, Martha Wilson.

Oct 2020 - Jan 2021
Courtesy of Undercurrent Projects on Artsy and www.theconfidencgame.website (link in bio)


.lanina .sanmiguel .tiff

11/20/2020

View exhibition on Artsy. View The Confidence Game website. Join the chat November 20.

View exhibition on Artsy. View The Confidence Game website. Join the chat November 20.

06/20/2020

photography:

💬 " with
・・・
So inspired by the Juneteenth uprisings from port shutdowns across the West Coast to statue toppling in DC to seeing giant billboards in Salt Lake City today, as I make the drive out of Colorado (for the first time in 99+ days) and journey westward to care for my family. Road warrior journey fueled by cold brew + the club wrap from , shades from , and artivist inspiration from .baum . Massive solidarity from the salt flats and the Rosh Chodesh new moon starry night sky somewhere on the Utah-Nevada border on Goshute land. "

06/18/2020

Thrilled to share that , and were chosen for magazine's feature on the importance of ***rart and ***rlove. Link in bio.

This is work by Laurence Philomene. From US, curated by Savannah Spirit.
1. Verified
Self portrait running into the fog, huldufólk, Iceland, 2019 (censored lol)

2. Self-portrait in lava field, Huldufólk, Iceland, 2019

3. puberty, 2019
Flora and I in our rooms after lunar new year, learning to sit with loneliness

@ Artsy

06/18/2020

Thrilled to share that , and we're ALL chosen for a magazine's feature on q***r love.

in "14 Artists on the Importance of Q***r Love", on Artsy:

💬 "It’s important for artists to portray + love—just like it’s important to portray any marginalized love—because it normalizes it, celebrates it, makes it beautiful. It makes other people humanize the people that they may be hating on, because love is a universal feeling and it can be felt in photos.

I really strive for diversity in my art; it’s really important to me to represent lots of different types of folks. I’m trying to allow people to exist without scrutiny and without people hating on them for being them. I think that how that’s going to come about is if we all are exposed to it more and it’s just a normal thing that people are just q***r and happy. A lot of times we see sob stories about gay and q***r people’s experiences, but there’s so much more than that one story of being oppressed and depressed. That is totally a reality, and a lot of people highlight that in a beautiful way, but I seek out the moments where we are full of joy and happiness, and in love with others.

Pride has been something that I’ve struggled to get involved with in the past. I’ve struggled to support something that seems like it’s being corporately sponsored, not that it came from that route. And I’m realizing in my older age—I’m about to turn 40—that it’s fine to have a critique of Pride. Where it started, with Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera throwing bricks at the cops, is important and we need to honor it. I was feeling not really seen, being a fat, trans, q***r person, and not a stereotypical le***an or gay man, and I realized there’s space for me.
I had a really good experience this past year when I went to San Francisco Pride for the first time. I was part of a contingent that was more social justice–based, talking about not just q***r issues, but racial and socioeconomic injustice. It felt very empowering and freeing; I felt a part of something. I was able to find my people, in a crowd of thousands." 🏳️‍🌈 ***rlove ***rart @ Artsy

06/18/2020

Thrilled to share that Shoog McDaniels and Laurence Philomene were identified by Magazine as important artists portraying q***r love.

💬
"It’s important for artists to portray LGBTQ+ love—just like it’s important to portray any marginalized love—because it normalizes it, celebrates it, makes it beautiful. It makes other people humanize the people that they may be hating on, because love is a universal feeling and it can be felt in photos.
I really strive for diversity in my art; it’s really important to me to represent lots of different types of folks. I’m trying to allow people to exist without scrutiny and without people hating on them for being them. I think that how that’s going to come about is if we all are exposed to it more and it’s just a normal thing that people are just q***r and happy. A lot of times we see sob stories about gay and q***r people’s experiences, but there’s so much more than that one story of being oppressed and depressed. That is totally a reality, and a lot of people highlight that in a beautiful way, but I seek out the moments where we are full of joy and happiness, and in love with others.
Pride has been something that I’ve struggled to get involved with in the past. I’ve struggled to support something that seems like it’s being corporately sponsored, not that it came from that route. And I’m realizing in my older age—I’m about to turn 40—that it’s fine to have a critique of Pride. Where it started, with Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera throwing bricks at the cops, is important and we need to honor it. I was feeling not really seen, being a fat, trans, q***r person, and not a stereotypical le***an or gay man, and I realized there’s space for me.
I had a really good experience this past year when I went to San Francisco Pride for the first time. I was part of a contingent that was more social justice–based, talking about not just q***r issues, but racial and socioeconomic injustice. It felt very empowering and freeing; I felt a part of something. I was able to find my people, in a crowd of thousands." @ Artsy

06/03/2020

***
Donate $50 or more for an organization supporting and and a New Yorker cartoonist will send you a with your cartoon doppelgänger holding a sign with your message of the moment. Linkinprofile for suggested organizations- just DM the cartoonist your donation receipt.

"Not everyone can be out in the streets, especially right now, but your cartoon selves can do whatever they want! What a strange, scary moment, and also an opportunity for innovative action. 📫
Can’t donate? Please engage with this post in any way you see fit: draw your own cartoon and post it on social media, or make your own protest postcard and send it to a friend, your mom, your local police precinct or elected official. Let’s flood some mailboxes.
***
Fine print: I will send you a high res digital file, for you to use as you wish, and then I’ll put the postcard in the mail to whatever address you provide me: if you are not comfortable with your address on the postcard, I can slip it into an envelope, no problem, or we can direct these images elsewhere. You’re in control."

06/03/2020

Signal boost.
If you have photographs you want me to post from the protests and vigils, DM me. These are .artist and
artist : "The worlds virus is racism, especially in the the US. It will not end until legislative measures against violence towards black men and women are passed, we have more politicians, business and landowners who are black, we have a true leader condemning this violence and holding these murderers held accountable and a genuine apology for all the years they’ve been held down, not heard, pushed to the bottom, thrown in jail, lynched and murdered. We must start seeing change NOW, make all these wrongs... right. Us white folks need to take a backseat: Listen, learn and help in any way we can. My way is making images to spread around. I’ll be posting that work for the next few days. Black Lives Matter Forever. ✊🏻✊🏼✊🏽✊🏾✊🏿 " @ New York, New York

05/20/2020

"Flora and I in our rooms after lunar new year, learning to sit with loneliness.” Laurence's work acts as a love letter to their community. Through long-form collaborative and autobiographical projects, they aim to celebrate trans existence, and to study identity as a space in constant flux. IG

This is Laurence Philomene, Sitting With Solitude, 2019.

It’s part of “US,” an online-only (of course!) exhibition curated by Savannah Spirit (.artist) for Undercurrent Projects on Artsy. For more powerful photographs by female cisgender, q***r, trans and non binary artists, check out the rest of the exhibition. Link in bio!

Including work by (), (), (), (), (), (), , (.cunningham.trust), (), , (), (), (), (.artist)

https://www.artsy.net/show/undercurrent-projects-us-curated-by-savannah-spirit
Special thank you to the Imogen Cunningham Trust, Howard Greenberg gallery, Salon 94 and the Smithsonian Institute

05/16/2020

This is Esther C Jackson, by Lola Flash, 2013

Lola Flash is a committed educator and artist using photography to challenge stereotypes and offer ‘new ways of seeing’. She was an active participant in ACT UP during the time of the AIDS epidemic in New York City (she was was notably featured in the 1989 “Kissing Doesn’t Kill” poster). Her lifelong project “[sur]passing” are portraits of African Americans using skin pigmentation as a color signifier for the black experience.

Esther Cooper Jackson is an African-American civil rights activist, former social worker and, along with Shirley Graham Du Bois, W. E. B. Du Bois, Edward Strong, and Louis E. Burnham, was one of the founding editors of the magazine Freedomways, a theoretical, political and literary journal published from 1961 to 1985.
IG

This is part of “US,” an online-only (of course!) exhibition curated by Savannah Spirit (.artist) for Undercurrent Projects on Artsy. For more powerful photographs by female cisgender, q***r, trans and non binary artists, check out the rest of the exhibition. Link in bio!

Including work by (), (), (), (), (), (), , (.cunningham.trust), (), (), (), (), (), (.artist)

https://www.artsy.net/show/undercurrent-projects-us-curated-by-savannah-spirit
Special thank you to the Imogen Cunningham Trust, Howard Greenberg gallery, Salon 94 and the Smithsonian Institute