Mark Bradford
Exhibition
Three Scenes II
Saturday, August 27, 3 pm
Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
Part II: The Club and Music Scene: Making Nightlife, Creating Community
This series of three gallery conversations proposes that we look at Mark Bradford's work in relation to different social and cultural contexts. Led by a guest presenter and museum staff, at each, they ask: What's the nature of this scene? What record of it do we see in Bradford's art? Why does it matter to his work and to culture now?
With Joe Bryl, acclaimed DJ, music programmer and former Sonotheque owner; Travis, multidisciplinary artist and lead member of the boundary-crossing music and performance group ONO; and Aay Preston-Myint, interdisciplinary artist and active scene-maker through the collaborative groups Chances Dances No Coast, and Mess Hall.
The Open Studio
Mark Bradford and Getty Museum promote Open Studio for Art Educators from The Art Reserve on Vimeo.
Los Angeles artist Mark Bradford conceived Open Studio, the inaugural project of the Getty Artists Program, for a target audience of K–12 teachers, with the goal of making contemporary arts education accessible to teachers and classrooms across the nation and around the world. Authored by noted international artists, Open Studio is a collection of art-making activities that presents the unique perspectives of practicing artists. Each activity is presented as a free, downloadable PDF that includes an artmaking prompt, an artist biography, and images of the artist and works of art by the artist.
The Mark Bradford Project connects MacArthur Fellow and contemporary artist Mark Bradford with various Chicago communities to interact around the creative process. Over the course of a year, Bradford will serve as a catalyst for ongoing discussions and community engagement projects, including interactions with students at Lindblom Math and Science Academy as well as teenagers in Chicago Public Library’s YOUmedia program. The theme of mapping, which Bradford explores in many of his paintings, serves as a unifying thread for these projects and discussions.
Building on the MCA Chicago’s long history of working with artists, and exemplifying the artist-activated, audience-engaged MCA vision, this yearlong creative residency is offered in conjunction with our May 2011 presentation of Bradford’s major solo exhibition, organized by the Wexner Center for the Arts.
Support for The Mark Bradford Project is generously provided by Helen and Sam Zell, The Joyce Foundation, Sara Lee Foundation, and The Broad Art Foundation.
About the artist
In six years, Mark Bradford, 45, has gone from being a self-proclaimed “beauty operator” at his mother’s beauty shop in South Los Angeles to navigating the tangled, lucrative weave that is the international art scene. Last week saw the opening of his solo show at the Whitney, “Neither New nor Correct,” featuring paintings of excavated billboards, posters, and other signage found in his Leimert Park neighborhood in L.A. We traced the path that got him here.
The First Mentor: At CalArts, he meets artist Daniel Joseph Martinez, known for his I CAN’T IMAGINE EVER WANTING TO BE WHITE badges at the 1993 Whitney Biennial.
The First Show: In 1998, he has a solo show, “Distribution,” at L.A.’s Deep River, a gallery started by Martinez and artist Glenn Kaino. “At the time,” says Martinez, “Mark was doing a little bit of painting and sculptural objects that had to do with the manipulation of black women’s hair fashion as sociopolitical commentary.”
The Big Break: “When I started working on what became ‘Freestyle,’ this exhibition of emerging artists [at the Studio Museum in Harlem],” says Thelma Golden, “I was going to L.A. and spoke to many people about artists I should see. Christian Haye [director of the Project gallery] suggested I see Mark.”
The First Sales:From the 2001 “Freestyle” exhibition, the Studio Museum in Harlem buys Enter and Exit the New Negro. But the first painting that Bradford sells,Dreadlocks caint tell me shit, goes to Eileen Harris Norton, for $3,500. “I didn’t have a dime to my name,” says Bradford, “and Eileen paid me real fast. I would have curled her hair, that’s how broke I was.” Later that year, recalls Norton, “I wanted to do a Christmas card with my kids, and I commissioned him and Daniel Martinez to do it.”
Creative Rupture: At the first Art Basel Miami, in 2002, Bradford sets up the installation Foxyé Hair, a beauty shop where he and a team do the hair of visitors. But he soon begins pulling away from this sort of imagery, which is being read as stereotypical.
The Setback: In 2003, Bradford shows at the Whitney Altria space—his first attempt at his “new vocabulary.” Times critic Roberta Smith and others aren’t enthused. “I knew when I was putting it up that it wasn’t there,” he says. “After that review, I’d show up to give a lecture and there would be two people.” He gets passed over for the 2004 Whitney Biennial.
The First Sales:From the 2001 “Freestyle” exhibition, the Studio Museum in Harlem buys Enter and Exit the New Negro. But the first painting that Bradford sells,Dreadlocks caint tell me shit, goes to Eileen Harris Norton, for $3,500. “I didn’t have a dime to my name,” says Bradford, “and Eileen paid me real fast. I would have curled her hair, that’s how broke I was.” Later that year, recalls Norton, “I wanted to do a Christmas card with my kids, and I commissioned him and Daniel Martinez to do it.”
Creative Rupture: At the first Art Basel Miami, in 2002, Bradford sets up the installation Foxyé Hair, a beauty shop where he and a team do the hair of visitors. But he soon begins pulling away from this sort of imagery, which is being read as stereotypical.
The New Chance: “Eungie Joo was the curator of the show ‘Bounce’ [at Redcat gallery], and she suggested I work big, but I said, ‘Yeah, but that’s expensive.’ Then she bought the canvas for me, so I said, ‘Aiight.’ She put her money where her mouth was, didn’t she?” “Bounce” includes Los Moscos—one of Bradford’s paintings in the 2006 Whitney Biennial.
The Major Recognition: In 2006, he receives the Bucksbaum Award, a $100,000 prize given to one Biennial participant. “When I got the call from Melva [Bucksbaum] to tell me I won, I was like, ‘Girl, shut up.’ I then had to put myself together, because I hadn’t met her at that time. So I said, ‘I’m sorry for calling you girl.’”
Today: “I can go to my own opening and the security guard will tell me that I have to go to the security entrance. Generally, when I tell people I’m a painter, they ask me if I have a card: ‘Yes, we’d like this room in this color.’ I still might get cards that say ‘Mark Bradford. Painter.’ If you need a bid, call Sikkema Jenkins”—his New York gallery, where his paintings can now reach $250,000.
-fromnymag.com
more on the artist: http://pinocchioisonfire.org/#/about/background
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