Justin Bua

Justin Bua is featured at The Source this month. See the article and the slide show at http://www.thesource.com/articles/20250/Groundbreaking-and-Internationally-Known-Artist...Justin-Bua/.

It is great to see his work getting featured. I like how the article focuses on his work in design and advertising, in addition to his canvas work. Bua's work really brings a hip-hop sensibility to a wide range of visual arts. I hope that some art historians and other visual culture types begin looking at his work and considering how he blends realism and irony in his work. I think he fits within the post-soul aesthetic and he shares some traits with Kehinde Wiley, Kerry Marshall, and Ellen Gallagher.

"Jay Z's Obsession with Warhol and Basquiat"

In a recent article at slate (http://www.slate.com/id/2241208/pagenum/all/#p2), Jonah Weiner examines why Jay Z seems obsessed with Warhol, Basquiat and Damien Hirst. Weiner concludes:

In the early '00s, thanks respectively to a broadening global market for rap and the hedge-fund-era rise of the superrich collector, both the hip-hop and art worlds were more flush with cash than ever before, and Jay-Z, Murakami, and Hirst were among the biggest beneficiaries, poster boys—and narrators—of the boom times. "I'm not a businessman, I'm a business, man," Jay-Z famously rapped. It could make a nice title for the next Hirst exhibit.

I found this argument fairly familiar, given I discuss Basquiat and the relationship between hip-hop culture and materialism in my book, Parodies of Ownership. I think that Weiner is generally right that hip-hop (not just Jay Z) is deeply concerned with ownership and the indices of ownership. However, I would disagree that the roots of this can be found in the early 2000s. As my book outlines, this has been a central issue since the founding moments of hip-hop. Perhaps, of more significance, I argue that it is they very aesthetic structure of hip-hop culture - not just the lyrics - where we can see this anxiety over ownership.

It also would have been nice if he would have looked at the history of appropriation in both hip-hop and contemporary art and how they seem to both rely on materialism and criticize it at the same time. I also think the article could have referenced the long-standing tradition within African American culture of arguing that only through economic success will social and political equality (i.e. power) follow.

I guess his article might be read to imply that knowledge, but the general tenor seems to be that Jay Z is unusually materialistic while lacking any self-consciousness about it. Again, I think the history of hip-hop offers too many counter examples (think all of the conscious and message rappers from Grandmaster Flash and Boogie Down Productions and Public Enemy to Mos Def, Immortal Technique, Dead Pres, and Solliliquies of Sound) to seriously suggest that Jay Z is somehow unaware of this ongoing critique of hip-hop's materialism or this longstanding debate within African American culture.

OK - I just had to get that off my chest!

Jacob Lawrence in Springfield!!!!!

In January and February, the Springfield Art Museum has 80 prints of the work of Jacob Lawrence. It is an impressive show.

Even though the show does not have much "critical apparatus" to explain what you are seeing, you can learn a lot about Lawrence's style and his growth. The biggest things that I realized during the show:

(1) Lawrence's canvases are related to jazz in that he really experiment with colors and poses over the course of his various series. There was a group of 7 prints about genesis were this can really be seen!

(2) Lawrence's historical imagery might have more in common with the 1980 & 1990 literary interest in historical novels and neo-slave narratives than I had ever realized. I think there is an article or book here for someone to write.

(3) In seeing the Lawrence prints, I saw a ton of visual references from William Johnson, Horace Pippen, Aaron Douglas, and Romare Bearden. I wish the exhibition would have discussed that more!

(4) Lawrence's murals for the MTA in NYC seem to engage with graffiti art. I would love to see someone examine this in more detail.

It was a great show. Highly recommended!