{"id":8934,"date":"2019-11-23T17:33:47","date_gmt":"2019-11-23T22:33:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kolajmagazine.com\/content\/?p=8934"},"modified":"2019-11-27T10:26:16","modified_gmt":"2019-11-27T15:26:16","slug":"vanessa-german-trampoline-resilience-black-body-soul","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/kolajmagazine.com\/content\/content\/collage-exhibitions\/vanessa-german-trampoline-resilience-black-body-soul\/","title":{"rendered":"Trampoline: Resilience & Black Body & Soul"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Joy Machine #3, Kick Push, Ring The Alarm, Fly<\/em> by Vanessa German
54″x94″x22″; mixed-media assemblage; 2019
Courtesy of the artist and Fort Gansevoort and Pavel Zoubok Fine Art, New York.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Trampoline: Resilience & Black Body & Soul<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

at Fort Gansevoort in New York, New York, USA
7 November-21 December 2019
Opening Reception: 7 November, 6-8PM<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Vanessa German\u2019s collaborative exhibition with the gallery showcases her richly encrusted sculptures, which she refers to as power-figures, alongside a series of wall-mounted altars that each act as seers or protectors carrying with them the gift of their own human technology: joy, love and protection for the souls of Black Americans. The work is made as an act of love in response to the daily, incremental injustices and violence made against Black and Brown people, their bodies and their souls. Each figure confronts us with the questions, \u201cHow do we survive? How do we, as hybrid-people, keep breathing? How then do we surpass mere existence into creative champions, future makers, lovers even?\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this newest body of work, German answers the call of the late, great Toni Morrison, who, in her 1993 Nobel lecture in Literature, invited all writers, and by extension all artists, to \u201cmake up a story\u2026For our sake and yours forget your name in the street; tell us what the world has been to you in the dark places and in the light. Don\u2019t tell us what to believe, what to fear. Show us belief\u2019s wide skirt and the stitch that unravels fear\u2019s caul.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is that stitch, that mark, the very act of creation that lies at the heart of Vanessa German\u2019s multi-disciplinary practice, one that combines mixed-media sculpture, installation, poetry, performance and activism. Across these media, German\u2019s work stands as a radical and unapologetic act of self-care, self-preservation and self-ease, an attempt to unfold past traumas and loosen the grip of longstanding tensions tied to her own Queerness, her own Blackness, her own struggle to live in the fullness of her physical and spiritual self. Through loving tribute and ritual, German responds to the continued graves of Black, Brown and Indigenous Humans, creating a Utopian future of true liberty. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Can I Love You Without Capitalism? How?<\/em> by Vanessa German
59″x67.5″x26″; mixed-media assemblage; 2019
Courtesy of the artist and Fort Gansevoort and Pavel Zoubok Fine Art, New York.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Varying yet specific contours and diverse materiality of her work highlight the intricacies of how bodies are perceived and manipulated, emphasizing self-fortitude and protection. In a series of lavishly embellished collages, German pays homage to tennis legends Venus and Serena Williams by transforming them into Madonnas. In these works, along with her tennis racket assemblages, we see how society deconstructs and dehumanizes Black women in sports instead of lifting them up as the champions they are.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

German\u2019s power-figures directly confront these multiple oppositions. Overwhelming in size and material, these works are not meant to ensue comfort. The viewer is forced to question and face the realities of their own history, enabling them to retain, release or reinvent. Across these media, German gives form and voice to her own understanding of freedom, of the creative process, of love, loss and survival. In Vanessa\u2019s own words, \u201cI am in Love with the deep survival, elastic resilience and ordinary, creative, genius of Black People. For the ways that we make ourselves bright against the slaughter of our own names, acts of ordinary, restorative, creative insistence. The insistent force of making, Seeing, playing, protection, Loving, whose evidence shapes the culture of a society that never visioned the Black Body into freedom, resources, or power.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

(text adapted from the curator’s press materials)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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INFORMATION<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fort Gansevoort<\/strong>
5 Ninth Avenue
New York, New York 10014 USA
(917) 639-3113 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hours:
Tuesday-Saturday, 10AM-6PM <\/p>\n\n\n\n

MAP<\/a> | WEBSITE<\/a> | FACEBOOK<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Trampoline: Resilience & Black Body & Soul at Fort Gansevoort in New York, New York, USA7 November-21 December 2019Opening Reception: 7 November, 6-8PM Vanessa German\u2019s collaborative exhibition with the gallery showcases her richly encrusted sculptures, which she refers to as…<\/p>\n

Read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":8935,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"gallery","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-gallery","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-collage-exhibitions","post_format-post-format-gallery"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/kolajmagazine.com\/content\/wp-content\/uploads\/vanessa-german-joy-machine-3-web.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2QTD7-2k6","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11604,"url":"http:\/\/kolajmagazine.com\/content\/content\/collage-exhibitions\/mind-mirror\/","url_meta":{"origin":8934,"position":0},"title":"Mind\/Mirror","author":"Christopher Byrne","date":"25 September 2021","format":"gallery","excerpt":"According to What by Jasper Johns88\"x191.75\" overall (six panels); oil, charcoal, and graphite on canvas with objects; 1964. The Middleton Family Collection. \u00a9 2021 Jasper Johns \/ Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY. 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