Drawing from Taino symbols, Afro Caribbean religious practices, Catholicism, Puerto Rican popular culture and folklore, as well as American and European visual traditions, Juan Sanchez recon-structs his own history and the histories of other Puerto Ricans as a multi-layered experience of identity with personal and political implications.
His works are on exhibit, with the works of Radcliffe Bailey and Renée Stout, at the Center for Documentary Studies, 1317 W. Pettigrew, January 19 to March 30, 2001.
Sonia Boyce achieved first critical acclaim as a young figurative artist at the height of the burgeoning Black British Art movement in the mid 1980s. Since then her work has been shown nationally and internationally. Boyce uses a wide range of media, from photography to banners, sculpture, painting, text, video and installation.; She will be coordinating Duke's Shades of Black conference this spring.
Ms. Boyce's presentation will be followed by a reception for her and David A. Bailey at the Franklin Center.
Dan Trueman is a composing performer on the 6-string violin and the Norwegian Hardanger fiddle. He is known as a designer of what he calls experimental instruments and unusual speakers. The former is a computer instrument, which sensitively responds to human performance gestures (e.g., violin bowing), and the latter is a sound dispersion system for electric instruments in chamber music. His concert music combines all of the above-mentioned interests. Trueman is currently affiliated with the Computer Music Center at Columbia University.
Dan Trueman will perform at the Nelson Music Room at Duke, February 3, 8 pm as part of the Encounters with the Music of Our Time series.
Yvette Christiansë's recently published book Castaway (Duke UP) has been celebrated as a powerful lyric epic. It is simultaneously a song of discovery, an anthem of conquest, and a tortured lamentation of exiles and slaves. Christiansë currently works on a new novel. With I, Sila she takes up the life of a slave woman in the early 19th century, who was imprisoned on South Africa's infamous Robben Island for the slaying of her nine-year-old son. Her narrative is a lullaby for the lost son, as well as an act of defiance against the weight of slavery. Born under apartheid in South Africa, the author grew up in exile in Australia. She is currently teaching in the US.
I took a lot of pictures of this whole group of people that I worked with consistently, and who happen to be the world's best snow-board riders. I became really interested in this group because they are like a tribe, an international tribe of Swiss, Austrian, Swedish, Finnish, Norwegian, American, Canadian, Spanish, Italian you name it. They come from different places and travel around, but they relate to each other through their media.
Marcopoulosıs photos are on exhibit at Partobject Gallery in Carrboro, February 10 to March 24, 2001.
Whitfield Lovell has presented his works in ten solo exhibits and numerous group shows in the USA and abroad. He often combines on-site drawings with found objects (photos, clothing, household objects), creating personal metaphors that reference his own family as well as broader themes of African-American ancestry and cultural memory. The first retrospective of the artist's work of the past decade has been published under the title Whispering from the Wall by the University of North Texas Press. Lovellıs visit to Duke is sponsored by Literacy through Photography, a project of the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke.
T.J. Anderson, one of the distinguished black musicians of the century. (Elma Lewis, The Cultural Post)
His own style of composition is audaciously modern, while preserving a deeply felt lyricism in melodic patterns, his harmonies are taut and intense without abandoning the basic tonal frame; his contrapuntal usages suggest folk-like ensembles; but he freely varies his techniques according to the character of each particular piece. (Nicholas Sloninsky, Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians)
Bouna Ndiaye has a strong commitment to WNCU and considers volunteering at the station an opportunity to introduce world music to the community. His popular show Bonjour Africa features music and interviews with contemporary African musicians throughout the continent of Africa. Ndiaye wants listeners to understand the culture that is associated with traditional music forms along with its special messages. He has also participated in programs broadcast over Voice of America. A native of Senegal and a graduate of NCCU, Bouna Ndiaye worked as an international auditor in Africa for several years and in 1996 returned to Durham to work at NCCU and WNCU.
I walk among photographs, wondering who it is these people think I am.
From In the Photograph Gallery in Stripling Byerıs new book of poetry: Catching Light
The two artists will present their works together on Sunday, March 4, 2 pm, at the Institute of the Arts, Duke University.
Tody McAuliffe (Drama) and Frank Lentricchia (Literature) are currently preparing the stage production of Don DeLillo's novel Mao II, to be presented at Duke in the spring of 2002: The production will make ex-tensive use of archival news footage, still photography, the work of Andy Warhol, and original digital video. In the spirit of the novel, we want to inundate the campus and community with photographic and media ima-gery with the intention of heightening our awareness of these forces at work in our age and their effect on literature, politics, and artistic expression (Jody McAuliffe).
Raj Kumar Javda, Munna Lal Bhat, and Praveen Kumar Arya are visiting artists from the Jaipur Kathak Kendra School in India. They are well-known performers and teachers of the Jaipur Style of Kathak Dance, as well as of the pakhavaz and tabla percussion for dance. This semester they will assist the Dance Program at Duke. Mekhala Devi Natavar, professor of Hindi at Duke, will host the luncheon. She has been teaching, performing and choreographing in the classical Kathak style.
One of the most uncompromising artists working today, Alfredo Jaar explores the complex relationships between developed nations and the so-called Third World. Combining elements of photography, architecture and theater, he tracks and highlights the ironies and injustices that characterize those relationships, and plays out the systematic pursuit of profit, which drives them. Jaar's visit is sponsored by Literacy through Photography, a project of the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke.