Through June 6 - Contact Traces at The Wattis Institute
I always love to see what the graduates of CCA's Curatorial Practice program come up with for their culminating exhibition, and this year they have themed the show around care and directly address the traumas of the pandemic. Featuring works by Derya Akay, Lenka Clayton, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Ilana Harris-Babou, and Jenny Kendler, Contact Traces questions how we take care of our selves, our community, our planet. Lenka Clayton's brilliant project 63 Objects Taken from My Son's Mouth, from which the above photograph is taken, highlights both a simple act of protection and also the constant observation (and quick reflexes) that motherhood requires. LaToya Ruby Frazier and Ilana Harris-Babou examine contemporary self-care practices in their pieces, and Jenny Kendler's work illustrates the helplessness one individual might feel against looming climate catastrophe. Meanwhile Derya Akay's joyful stand outside the gallery invites any and all passers-by to help themselves to tea and coffee, fresh fruit and flowers. The collected artworks point to systems that were already unsustainable before the pandemic, and invite us to imagine a more interconnected and just way forward. While you're in the Wattis neighborhood I also highly recommend a stop at Dumpling Time, and the current shows at Hosfelt Gallery featuring a small tribute to our beloved William T. Wiley as well as Isabella Kirkland's extraordinary paintings of Earth's biodiversity and Patricia Piccinini's sculptures and video depicting life considerably more unnatural.
Other things I liked this week:
- The Last American Aristocrat: The Brilliant Life and Improbable Education of Henry Adams by David S. Brown. I enjoyed this less for the biography of Henry Adams himself, who was a little too racist, elitist, and cynical for my tastes, than for the keenly observed history of the times Adams lived through in American and world history. Brown is an excellent writer and really keeps things moving too.
- The House Is Black by Forough Farrokhzad. A revelatory 1963 short film shot documentary-style in a leper colony, Farrokhzad mixes in her own poetry as well as excerpts from world literature to paint an unflinching and deeply human portrait of people isolated from society due to their disease.
- The UC Botanical Garden's YouTube channel, where you can explore the garden from the comfort of your home, has been a balm during the last year. Hoping to visit in person soon too!
- I feasted on many vegan goodies from Sarap Shop and Mackbox and Ube Mami last Sunday at the Oh My Gulay festival and just enjoyed being out and about in the lovely environs of Kapwa Gardens.
- The virtual option for the current Smuin al Fresco season is an excellent alternative for those of us who can't attend the live events, and I very much enjoyed the Pod Peony program last Sunday.
- The Marsh continues to knock it out of the park with their online programming too, with the premiere last night of Candace Johnson's new musical series about the art songs of Black composers, Music to My Ears: Hearing Adolphus Hailstork. She's performing it again tonight if you happen to read this in time, otherwise I'm very much looking forward to future episodes.