|
LOVE: Still Not the Lesser
at the Museum of Contemporary Photography (Chicago) August 17 – December 22, 2023 Curator “I use the word ‘love’ here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace…”
–James Baldwin, excerpt from The Fire Next Time, 1963 “Has everyone been in love? Not on the basis of the evidence. If they have, they’ve forgotten it. If everyone had been in love, they’d treat their children differently. They’d treat each other differently.” –James Baldwin, from “Meeting the Man: James Baldwin in Paris,” 1970 Link to website
Link to exhibition essay Link to curatorial tour Link to e-Flux public programs feature featuring: Alia Ali, Alicia Bruce, Jorian Charlton, Jess T. Dugan, Mari Katayama, Kierah KIKI King, Mous Lamrabat, Tom Merilion, Salma Abedin Prithi, Modou Dieng Yacine, Yuge Zhou, and the debut of Jorge Ariel Escobar. LOVE: Still Not the Lesser brings together twelve international artists, uniting across communities to share the ways they encounter and understand love. These artists explore dynamics within romantic partnership, sensual eroticism, family structures, social utopia, and life and death. They observe and declare circumstances of love that serve various intentions.
The projects on view in LOVE range from an expressive courtship dance enacted by two people learning how to meaningfully connect despite barriers of distance, to an embodied portrayal of feeling one’s own sensuality and pleasure. From an adult son’s photo collaboration with his nonagenarian father during his artist mother’s last weeks of life, to the love and pride held within queer parenting. Themes of visibility and adoration recur as concepts embraced by many of the LOVE photographers, as they use portraiture and self-portraiture to affirm many different types of bodies as divinely worthy of enjoying gentle care and affection. The exhibition presents love as a universal value of respect and care for all humans. LOVE: Still Not the Lesser features artists Alia Ali, Alicia Bruce, Jorian Charlton, Jess T. Dugan, Mari Katayama, Kierah KIKI King, Mous Lamrabat, Tom Merilion, Salma Abedin Prithi, Modou Dieng Yacine, Yuge Zhou, and the debut of Jorge Ariel Escobar. Love is a right of existence. |
excerpt from "Dear Love" by Salma Abedin Prithi, 2011-2018
FOCAL POINT: Exhibiting Artists Alicia Bruce and Tom Merilion, in conversation with Asha Iman Veal
LOVE: Still Not the Lesser opening reception, 2023
MoCP Book Circle: "All About Love" by bell hooks
led by artist Anwulika Anigbo, of The Love Ethic Project, and Megha Ralapati, of CEC ArtsLink, November 2023 
A New Decade of Dance Films: Screenings by Kierah KIKI King and Patricia Nguyen, October 2023
Artist Talk: Jorge Ariel Escobar and Yuge Zhou, November 2023
|
