5 Digital Art Talks You Won’t Want to Miss This Week
Muzae Sesay in his studio, 2019, courtesy of the artist
In the Artist’s Studio | Muzae Sesay with the Museum of the African Diaspora
Since closing to the public due to mandatory shelter-in-place orders, the Museum of the African Diaspora has been organizing online studio visits with some of their favorite artists each Wednesday at 1:00pm PST. This week, MoAD staff members will be visiting the studio of Oakland-based artist Muzae Sesay, whose professional career and focus “derives from a lifelong commitment to understanding our collective relationship to space, memory, community, and the perceived truths within them.”
The MoAD writes, “Utilizing skewed perspectives of space and shape collapsed into flat two-dimensional planes, Muzae creates surreal geometric interiors, exteriors, landscapes, and structures—presenting a situation in which to be experienced and explored. Inspired by ideas of cultural reflection and developed by questioning the validity of remembrance, his work often depicts worlds created in response to a social introspection and a continual challenge of perceived reality. This process involves taking imagery from the physical world and reducing them to rudimental forms that then populate fragmented universes compiled by perspectival fallacies and tied together by harmonious color composition. The viewer is compelled to understand the space, question its dimensionality, dive inside and walk around.”
When: January 13, 2021 @ 1:00 pm – 2:15 pm PST
Cost: Pay what you can
Link: RSVP here
David Park: 7x7 | SFMOMA
This online program hosted by SFMOMA will bring together seven distinguished guests to reflect on work by the late artist David Park (1911–1960), best known for his contribution to the Bay Area Figurative Art Movement. In conjunction with the exhibition David Park: A Retrospective, this event will include speakers such as Helen Park Bigelow, daughter of David Park and author of the memoir David Park, Painter: Nothing Held Back, Nancy Boas, author of the biography David Park: A Painter’s Life, Gretchen Diebenkorn Grant, daughter of artist Richard Diebenkorn, Corey Keller, curator of photography at SFMOMA, Francis Mill, artist and gallerist at Hackett Mill, representing the estate of David Park, as well as Belinda Tate, executive director at Kalamazoo Institute of the Arts, Wayne Thiebaud, and Janet Bishop (moderator), Thomas Weisel Family Chief Curator and Curator of Painting and Sculpture at SFMOMA and lead curator of David Park: A Retrospective.
When: January 14, 2021 @ 5:00 pm PST
Cost: Free
Link: RSVP here
Lunchtime Art Talk on Artist Jacqueline Kiyomi Gork | Hammer Museum & Huntington Library
Every Wednesday at lunchtime, the Hammer Museum’s curatorial department leads discussions on artists in the “Made in L.A. 2020: a version” exhibition. This Wednesday, join Ikechukwu Onyewuenyi, Made in L.A. 2020 assistant curator of performance, for a discussion about artist Jacqueline Kiyomi Gork, as part of the Lunchtime Art Talk series.
When: January 13, 2021 @ 12:30 pm PSTCost: Free
Link: RSVP here
The Black Index: Artists in Conversation | Contemporary Art Center Gallery + Getty Research Institute
In conjunction with the digital exhibition opening this week, The Black Index, at the Contemporary Art Center Gallery at the University of California, Irvine, this event will host two conversations—artist Lava Thomas with professor Leigh Raiford, and artist Whitfield Lovell with curator LeRonn P. Brooks, exploring the significance of the artists' work in the exhibition along with the role of Black artistic practice within our current moment of political and social turmoil.
This conversation is organized by Bridget R. Cooks, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of African American Studies and Department of Art History (UCI) in partnership with Getty Research Institute's African American Art History Initiative.
When: January 15, 2021 @ 11:00 - 12:30 pm PSTCost: Free
Link: RSVP here
Time Decorated: The Musical Influences of Jean-Michel Basquiat - Part 1 | The Broad
While not live, the first segment of a new video series from the Broad, Time Decorated: The Musical Influences of Jean-Michel Basquiat, will be released this Thursday, January 14th. Dedicated to the famed New York City artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, the video series includes three segments, Jazz, Punk and No Wave, and Hip-Hop, where both creatives and scholars discuss the impact of each genre on Jean-Michel Basquiat’s style. Produced by Quincy Jones Productions, this particular segment features LA jazz musician Terrace Martin as well as input from Quincy Jones himself.
When: January 14, 2021 (*This has been rescheduled for January 21, 2021)Cost: Free
Link: View here