Isolde Brielmaier & Trevor Schoonmaker / BICA -#1
Horace Brockington
Isolde Brielmaier and Trevor Schoonmaker are two young emerging curators who have mounted various and diverse exhibition, internationally. Breilmaer holds a Ph.D. from Columbia in Art History where she had trained in formalism and critical theory. Her independently curated exhibitions have explored where popular culture and formal art history intersect. Trevor Schoonmaker trained in art history at University of Michigan. His exhibitions "Dead Presidents" and "Detroit" fused the aesthetic of music, global-political culture, art and history. Most recently, Schoonmaker was one of the recipients of American Center Foundation Young curator Grant for Art and Research.
My conversation with two curators took place in the context of mounting their exhibition "Living for the City " at the Jack Shainman Gallery. Breilmaier and Schoonmaker are two young curators who have opted to continue in the tradition of non-profit institutions. Each reflected on some of the same ideas and concerns with formal tradition of art making as espoused by gallerist Jessica Murray whom I interviewed in a previous edition of this publication.
After much contemplation, Brielmaier and Schoonmaker made an in important decision to form the Brooklyn Institute of Contemporary Art (BICA), an organization that they describe as a space where art meets global culture. A space that is about new ideas and new audience that reflect and draw upon the varied communities and resources of Brooklyn and the world beyond: "With eyes on the world’s contemporary art scenes, cities, cultures and trends, BICA brings you what happening on the ground–in Brooklyn, in Cairo, in Mumbai, Sao Paolo, in Johannesburg, in Beijing, or in Moscow–while encouraging, supporting and presenting artistic experimentation in sound, video, film, electronic media, design, photography, painting, drawing, sculpture and performance and installation.
"BICA’s team is dedicated to enhancing the visibility and accessibility of international contemporary art. We present dynamic exhibitions and public programs that bridge the gap between the art world and urban culture and bring the works of artists from culturally-diverse backgrounds to the attention of the broadest possible audience."
Scheduled to open in Brooklyn’s downtown BAM cultural district in the fall of 2007 the curators have organized a series of exhibitions and programs at various venues in New York City. The first of such exhibitions is "Living for the City" at the Jack Shainman Gallery in Chelsea. " Living for the City" is a multi-media exhibition offering work by new and recent works by established and emerging artists from around the world, including Kader Attie (Paris/Algiers), Kevin Ei-Ichi deForest (Montreal/Kyoto), Jean- Ulrick Desert (Port-au-Prince/Berlin/New York), Dario Escobar (Guatemala City), Theo Eshetu (Rome/ Addis Abba), Alexis Esquivel (Havana), Kianga Ford (Los Angeles), Patrick Hamilton (Santiago), Satch Hoyt (New York/London), Taiyo Kimura (Tokyo), Sara Maneiro (Caracas), Senam Okudzeto (Accra/Basel/London/New York), Mark Powell (Mexico City/Detroit), Thomas Rapai ( Detroit), Sa’dia Rehman (New York/Islamabad) Lila Subramanian (New York/Mumbai), and works by DJs Dipio ( Philadelphia), and Eddie Stats ( Brooklyn). Collectively the works are intended to address the manner in which urban settings around the world have shaped and are transformed by the artists’ ideas of community, globalization, immigration, industry, exile, trans-nationalism, politics and popular culture.
The exhibition "Living in the City", explores both the physical and psychological impact of the urban environment. Contextually, the exhibition fuses high art and popular culture with an under current of social and political issue. An essential element of their curatorial approach is apparent here namely the inclusion of emerging artists and those who are more established. Most of the included artists have limited or no exposure in the New York area. Artists such as Senam Okudzeto, and Taiyo Kimura have extensive exhibition histories outside of the U.S, and the artist Jean- Ulrick Desert, has been a fringe figure in New York art circle for years.
Taiyo Kimura’s installation of paper-mache figurines inside milk cartons sculpture/installation explores issues of population and urban density humorously reflects upon the notion of the individual and the crowd. Kevin Ei-Ichi de Forest " Record Shop" installation plays off one of the key ingredients of the BICA’s curatorial team intent, the fusing of high art and popular culture. De Forest’s installation consists of two rows of albums cover place on wooden shelves. In front of the shelves is a milk crate filled with albums, echoing DJ culture. What brings the work into the "high art" arena, is the re-processing of the album covers art using diverse painting methods to create new imagery that reference the history of modern art, moving from abstraction to realism. At times the cover art plays against the very music type, the album is supposed to represent. Senam Okudzeto’s video and sound installation incorporates now familiar "African "plaid shopping bags. The curators have noted that the work is a direct reference the l983 Expulsion Order issued by the Nigerian Minister of Internal Affairs that demanded all "illegal immigrants " leave the country within fourteen days. The cheap red and blue plastic carry–all in which refugees packed their belongings–are referred throughout he English speaking West Africa as "Ghana-must-go". Okudzeto’s work "Ghana Must GO’ poses the question: how is that a plastic bag, made in China, becomes the only repository for post-colonial memory?
Along with these standouts, the curators fuse the soundworks of DJ Eddie Stats, the installations of Kader Attia, Nightclub/Mosque, and Sell/Buy. Alexis Esquivel’s Metropia is a video installation of the failed urban utopia of Havana. Lila Subramanian’s "Bollywood Cowboys" Series uses the film sub-genre called "curry western" as a point of departure to engage cultural imperialism and the collapsing of cultural boundaries. Overall, the result is active, informative and challenging exhibition of the type we have come to expect from these two young curators.
It becomes apparent within the context of my conversation with these two curators, is that their curatorial intent is less about the emerging or the new, as it the fusion of artists both new, often overlooked in the recent wave of the "next" thing. In terms of exhibitions and programming there are no fixed structures or curatorial strategies. Their projects seek to fuse artists globally and aesthetically with the intent of exploring artistically and intellectually, that point at which art history offers diversities.
Trevor Schoonmaker: Both Isolde and I come from academic backgrounds–Isolde has her Ph.D. from Columbia, and I was working on one at Michigan before I quit–so we’re comfortable with that realm. Originally we toyed with the idea of a commercial space but as you know it just a different ballgame all together. We know, as curators there are certain things we can do. For example we know we can put together good shows, and get good press …those sorts of things, because we have previously done it. We are confident that, and we can find good artists, but that does not equate to selling a lot of work, and running a tight business. That’s a big difference. Equally, I think going not for profit is far more important for us, mainly because its suits our sensibilities.
Isolde Brielmaier: We are trying to frame what’s is going on now. It about history, it’s about bringing different elements about popular culture, music and fashion. Globalization has existed for centuries, its just the networks of interactions have changed, and it’s about capitalizing on that in sort of experimental, innovative, exciting and very accessible ways–ways that are really relevant.
I’m first generation American, so I have family all over the world such that globalization seems natural. My background is in art history, international contemporary, I actually wrote my dissertation on photography, and I did a triangle between the Swahili coast, South Asia Mumbai, and the U.K.
When we say we want to encourage experimentation across media, and fully integrate sound, in an exhibition context, a gallerist will tell you selling a sound piece is not that easy, it may become easy in five years. I think that in a commercial space, economics really predominate, you have to really like the work, it has to be strong, it has to be provocative, but when push comes to shove, it about the money and keeping your space open, and being able to fund that venture.
On funding a non profit space:
IB: Unfortunately, in this country, grantsmanship has become more about the audience, then the work, about diversifying your audience. It almost seems that the concern is less about the work and more about the audience and who’s coming through your doors. But, one of our board members said early on. "Don’t say diversity–just do it." So Trevor and I didn’t blink, because everything we’ve done has an element of diversity as a primary concern. Diversification comes naturally. It may be our interest, it may be the kind of work, we attracted to or it may partially due to the fact that we have feet in academic, art, fashion and music. Our interests–and we’re hoping that this exhibition upstairs is an example of that–is always to a significant degree in terms of audience.
On bringing diversity to Brooklyn:
TS: We are not yet sited but we are closing in on downtown Brooklyn.
IB: Part of final deciding factor as to where to place the institution will be based on practical terms that are where there is a space. Essentially, BAM has been very active and supportive in helping us locate a site, as has our board. We‘ve looked at various spaces throughout the region. Trevor and I see BICA as tied to some type of community thus we have rejected some places that would be great spaces, but removed from any type of community context.
TS: Downtown Brooklyn has a proximity to Manhattan that is fantastic. It easy to get Manhattanites here but will it always a challenge to engage people in the communities. In the downtown Brooklyn community there is vibrant diverse group of people, that’s very multicultural and very educated.
IB: Still, those aren’t the only people we trying to reach. This is where programming will play a key part…I know this because I do a lot of work with contemporary art especially video and photography from North Africa, and the Middle East. No one has ever spoken with that community based on Atlantic Avenue.
TS: All the communities in the area have some flavor, and they are all accessible. Artists working in Brooklyn began with economics, but now Brooklyn is so expensive it not about space, its really about Brooklyn–it’s about energy and the soul of Brooklyn, and even the art community.
Brooklyn has a feel to it; it has a new vitality, an edge. More so in reality and in terms of the neighborhoods and the influx of people there is a mixing going on in Brooklyn that not going on in other areas. However, the fusion going on in the communities is not happening in the art institutions. BICA will help to facilitate that in an institutional setting. We have had a lot of success bringing huge populations of Brooklyn to shows in Manhattan, so we fell it will be easy to gather a population to shows in Downtown Brooklyn.
IB: Through exhibitions and programming, and by combining art with an assortment of popular culture events, bringing in different ideas, and bringing in others curators, we aim to reach a broader audience. This is a major challenge and we are very aware of it. We want to be taken serious as an art institution, but you also want to get regular audience into the space.
As curators and working with different artists we can present visually strong and provocative art, but somehow it can also be relevant to a whole new group of people. Trying to think in innovative ways about the artists we like and ways we present them leads us to consider how can we engage that a larger non-art community.
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