Category Archives: Citizenship

Citizenship

Not My President

Friends abroad and fellow citizens, with Donald Trump winning the race for President of the United States, I want to let a few things be known:

I voted for Hillary. She was the most qualified candidate, with her a long career as a lawyer and public servant, and deep knowledge of international affairs. I had a few reservations about her hawkishness towards Russia, but there was no question what was the right thing to do in the voting booth yesterday. I voted to the best of my ability as a citizen, and I voted my conscience.

Donald Trump does not represent me. His hate-filled, divisive, misogynist, xenophobic rhetoric is offensive as words, and terrifying if translated into action. I don’t believe in further militarizing the US-Mexican border. I don’t believe in breaking up families with undocumented students and workers. Unlike many in the US, I don’t believe that our country is fundamentally Christian, or that fearing Muslims and Islam is rational. The thought of barring Muslims recalls Japanese American internment—one of the dark periods of American history. Further, I believe that Trump is a megalomaniac. He’s ill-prepared and ill-suited, and driven by his own overinflated self-image. When he lies about what he’s said on the public record, it seems, frankly, delusional. I do not believe he knows what’s best, or that he possesses the humility necessary to learn. His attitude towards women is regressive; we are more than objects or a demographic segment, we’re 51% of the world. Trump has led a cloistered, elite life, and they way he talks about Black and brown communities reveals ignorance and limited real world life experiences. He’s known for stiffing workers and avoiding taxes; he values profits over people—objectionable in business and wrong for lawmaking. His campaign has been short on substance and long on fear-mongering. Rural white people who have voted for Trump to preserve carbon-fuel jobs, to balm a fragile sense of whiteness, who are nostalgic for peak white privilege, it’s a pity you feel so disenfranchised. But there is a lot more at stake than draining non-renewable resources and reassuring white identity.

What inspires me. Yesterday, after I voted, my heart swelled with patriotism. I was looking forward to the first female president, and to stop hearing Trump’s incendiary rhetoric. Friends posted about living in the future that suffragettes made. H made a great point that’s easy to forget: the majority of people living in America couldn’t vote before 1920, and even then people of color couldn’t vote until 1965. It felt great to exercise this hard-won right among neighbors. I thought about my mom, and how she still displays a newspaper clipping from the early 1980s. It’s from our small town newspaper, announcing that she and a few others had become naturalized. My mom’s education was curtailed by economic necessity and the Vietnam War; she’s proud of studying hard, passing her naturalization test, and becoming a citizen.

Disappointment. The more I’ve traveled within the US, the more I’ve deepened my appreciation of its cultural diversity. I love that places like Santa Fe; Wichita; Minneapolis; Portland, OR; and Eastport, ME are so distinct. Our diversity and commitment to equality and pluralism are what makes America’s promise great. It’s intensely disheartening that so many fellow citizens are willing to take such a massive risk on a candidate with no experience as a politician, out of fear that a female candidate may carry on the legacy of our first Black president.

If you voted for a third-party candidate in a state like Florida, Michigan, North Carolina or New Hampshire… While in principle everyone should be free to vote their conscience, the way our electoral system is set up, some votes do matter more than others, and I’d argue that the responsibility to vote strategically surpasses the modest amount of self-expression of a protest vote. If you want to change the system, do it with advocacy and legislation.

The presidency should be decided by popular vote. The electoral system was created to benefit slave-holding Southern states. It’s archaic, un-Democratic, and confusing to the common citizen. Urge your representatives to support the National Popular Vote bill.

 

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Citizenship

Thoughts on galleries in San Francisco Chinatown

Capital Gallery and Et Al make two galleries now in San Francisco Chinatown. It is premature to call a trend, and probably fear-mongering to mention gentrification. But while I like these two galleries in Chinatown, I wouldn’t necessarily want to see many more.

Reasons to be excited:

  • New galleries in SF! Especially after all the recent closures….
  • These are good galleries. They’re curatorially interesting: Artists currently at Capital: Virginia Overton, Will Rogan, Cynthia Daignault (nice to see local and non-local artists in dialogue; though if this were in Chelsea I wouldn’t be impressed). Et Al seems to specialize in an area in which I’ve long felt the Bay Area underperforms: giving well-deserved solo shows to local artists (however the current show by Anthony Discenza may be an exception, as he’s got representation and visibility; I’ve posted impressions).
  • They espouse and maintain professional-level display. There are plenty of scrappy, funky, or difficult spaces here already.

Reasons to proceed with caution:

  • SF Chinatown is already dense and hemmed in by the Financial District and touristy North Beach. The very existence of Chinatown, as an idea and a place, has been contested with xenophobia and racism, throughout its history and particularly following the 1906 earthquake. (LA Chinatown’s galleries are different; they seem to occupy a sleepier area away from vital markets used by residents, whereas there isn’t really under-utilized space in SF.) I hope it would be safe to assume that any proud Bay Area residents need not be reminded of Manilatown, the I-Hotel, and the dangers of gentrification.
  • I didn’t grow up in Chinatown. Yet its continuing importance in my personal and family life might help illustrate its overall importance to Chinese Americans in the Bay Area. My grandparents lived there—the neighborhood is an ideal community for Chinese-speaking seniors, especially when you consider aging people’s isolation in car-oriented suburbs. Like countless many before her, when my mom first came to the US, she stayed in a boarding house in Chinatown; it’s a point of entry, a navigable community in which to find a home and learn about a new country. Later, after my parents married and relocated north to work, we would visit Chinatown every Sunday to visit family and stock up on groceries, driving an hour each way. When we moved closer, I gained Chinese language skills by attending Saturday school on Jackson Street. As a young adult trying to form my identity, I’d roam Chinatown in seek of meaningful connections. Eventually I gained an internship at the Chinese Cultural Center (on Kearny just north of the galleries), which organized a trip—the only program of its kind to do so in the US—to visit my ancestral village in the Pearl River Delta region in China. That experience was a life-changing event. I garnered a new understanding of myself, my parents, and my grandparents, as well as an un-describable feeling that comes with knowing that one of my family lines can be traced back 34 generations. Despite moving to suburbia, my parents enjoyed many years attending events at a family association, one of their primary means for social connection, on Stockton. (In fact, most of the people at my wedding—held in a banquet hall on Grant, one block west of the galleries—were members of my parent’s family association.) My mom continues to attend association events and patronize Chinatown’s Buddhist temples, traditional pharmacies, and bookstores.

Non-Chinese San Franciscans might think of Chinatown as only Grant Street—as essentially a constructed tourist trap, with some cheesy dive bars thrown in. But it’s much more culturally rich and important than that. Even if Chinese Americans reside throughout the Bay Area now, SF Chinatown is still the beating heart of this community.

This is not a criticism of the galleries or the people that run them. Et Al is run by a trio; of which Jackie Im and Aaron Harbour are vocal supporters of contemporary art and critical discourse in the Bay Area. Capital is run by two Bay Area artists, Jonathan Runcio (I liked his work at Romer Young’s booth at NADA last year) and Bob Linder, who co-directed Queen’s Nails. I am sure that finding affordable space and running a gallery in SF is extremely challenging now, and those efforts are to be commended. If anyone can situate a gallery sensitively within a neighborhood, I hope they—and anyone following in their footsteps—can.

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Citizenship

Because we want full police accountability;
Because Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Akai Gurley, Ramarley Graham, Oscar Grant, and countless others;
Because exercising our democratic rights are the only way to know we still have them.

11 days of action—one for every time Eric Garner said, “I can’t breathe”:
http://www.thisstopstoday.org/11daysofaction

Link
Citizenship

Welcome the New: Bay Area Society for Art and Activism is here

My dear friend ET has been collaborating with genius Bay Area artists and activists to lay the groundwork for a new, optimistic organization. And they’re launching now!

Check out their Arts & Activism Quarterly; it features an interview with moi about the nineties, activism, and art, and includes tons of orgs and people that have inspired me.

It also hosts the beautifully-shot, poignant trailer for “The Last Black Man in San Francisco,” by Joe Talbot.

Talbot is among the many artists that will be featured in the Society’s kickoff party this Saturday night. It’s where I’d be, if I were in SF this weekend.

for more info see http://artandactivism.org/overnight-strange/

Overnight Strange Flyer

—

Sue me; I’m feeling optimistic, too. Before we dive into the season of gluttony and shopping mayhem, here’s where I’ve put my money, and if you are able, maybe you can too:

  • The Lab’s triumphant return spearheaded by Dena Beard. Keeping SF weird, loud, and experimental.
  • May Day Space, a cultural worker/education/organiging space led by a diverse crew in Bushwick.
  • The Society, of course! Become a member! We won’t concede SF so easily!
  • W.A.G.E. for Work. Six days left to go in their campaign to bring justice for all artists!
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Citizenship, Meta-Practice

More on the Power of “No”

Artists, where is your line? How do you know you’ve crossed it? Are you prepared to do what’s necessary after you’ve crossed your line?

Artist Steve Lambert pledges to give away any prize money received from a right-wing, anti-civil rights family whose fortunes are made in pyramid schemes and the military industrial complex.

So today I pledged, if I win I will not keep any of the money. I will hand over all my award money to the LGBT Fund of Grand Rapids. I will also volunteer to come back to Grand Rapids with the Center for Artistic Activism to work with LGBT to fight for equality.

The reason I became an artist is because I believe it helps create free human beings. It can show us other ways of looking at the world, other ways the world can be. It makes us more empathetic, more understanding, and more open. It helps us grow. I think the money behind ArtPrize is working against, what I see as, the spirit of art itself.

http://visitsteve.com/news/no-thanks-artprize/

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Citizenship, Meta-Practice

Intersection for the Arts as We Knew It

San Francisco’s relentless economics cuts close to the bone, dismantling Intersection for the Arts.

I had the honor of exhibiting at San Francisco non-profit art organization Intersection for the Arts in 2004 and 2012.

Backlit curator Kevin Chen speaks at the opening of "In Other Words," 2012. my Positive Signs drawings are on the wall behind him.

Backlit curator Kevin Chen speaks at the opening of “In Other Words,” 2012. My Positive Signs drawings are on the wall behind him.

 

In particular, curator Kevin Chen has been a major ally to me (he’s the “k” that kicks off this sequence of artistic advancements on Works Make Work). Moreover, he’s been a thoughtful, dedicated contributor towards keeping SF’s art programming current, diverse, and critical. (Here’s a great 2008 SFGate profile that captures his essence, i.e., “Placid, soft-spoken, with a low, late-night-radio kind of voice, Chen brings to his work a combination of sangfroid and compulsive work ethic.”) He’s worked countless late nights personally installing exhibitions; his work as a curator has really been curator/exhibitions manager/installer/art handler/framer. He could also be found delivering erudite introductions to Intersection’s jazz performances, and donating his time and expertise to classes and likeminded arts nonprofits. He’s a practicing artist, drawing detailed graphite drawings inspired by San Francisco’s skyline.

I came away from my first exhibition at Intersection’s Valencia Street location impressed with the staff’s commitment to excellence and inquiry despite a shoestring budget.

They’ve stayed afloat amidst recessions and busts, but they won’t survive San Francisco’s current climate intact. They’ve laid off curators including Kevin, and will suspend programming. See Christian L. Frock’s “San Francisco’s Intersection for the Arts Suspends Programs, Lays Off Curators” on KQED Arts (May 22, 2014) for more info. For many artists, this is another painful, irrevocable loss in the art community, as documented in Frock’s “Priced Out” series.

Since I moved away in 2010, people ask if I’ll return to the Bay Area. Its clearly hostile conditions, and the tolls they’re taking on the arts community, do not beckon.

What is to be done? Perhaps, as MA implored,

Everyone, go to galleries, museums, performances, and any and all cultural events!!! Invest in your local cultural institutions before they are gone…. please!

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Citizenship

#2 SAVE
 THE 
SHRINKING 
PUBLIC 
DOMAIN. 
Public 
parks, 
schools, community 
centers–
everything 
public 
that 
is 
needed 
for 
affordable neighborhoods
–
are 
shrinking 
and getting 
privatized. 
At 
the neighborhood 
level, 
we 
need 
to 
protect 
and 
expand 
the commons. 
Keep 
the 
libraries 
open. 
Stop 
concessions 
from 
taking 
over 
the parks. Save 
neighborhood 
schools 
and 
keep 
them 
integrated 
and public. 
Don’t 
let 
services for 
the 
less 
fortunate
–
like 
soup kitchens 
and 
homeless 
shelters
–
be 
driven 
out 
by high 
rents.

By Tom Agnotti
(Via SB)

(One of) Five Things You Can Do to About Gentrification (in New York City)

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Citizenship, Meta-Practice

No, Thank You: Letting a tech-sponsored art opportunity pass

My response letter to a tech company’s in-house art program.

Recently I was invited to submit a proposal to a tech company for an artist’s residency or commission at their corporate offices. The project manager was very gracious. The program sounds fiscally generous. I debated whether or not to do it. Some colleagues have participated or will do so (I wish them nothing but the best), and I’ve benefitted from such projects as well as sales to other tech firms. Still, my instinct was to propose an idea that would never be accepted, but I didn’t really want to waste time essentially pranking a nice person with a fake proposal. So I wrote and submitted the following….

—

I’m skeptical of the idea of creating artwork as a site-specific, private, corporate commission with employees as the constituency. Here’s why.

  • I try to make my work not about me; I try to make it about the viewer and his/her perceptions or emotions. The viewer and the context shape the meaning of the work. For your program, I’d make work for your audience and your site, so I’d have to ask myself, Why these employees? Why these offices? And I haven’t come up with good enough answers.
     
  • As I understand it, there’s no public viewing program, so the commission serves employees, and ultimately, the corporation’s goals such as maintaining morale or acting as recruitment or PR talking points. Psychologists like Phil Zimbardo have written that marketing efforts exploit humans’ instinctual reciprocity; by offering perks, the corporation may well be influencing workers to spend increasing hours of unpaid overtime at their jobs, rather than in their communities (where they could support local public museums and galleries).

    Perhaps you see your program as a philanthropic venture benefitting artists. There are many ways to support artists. A purchase program of existing works would allow artists like me to spend less time working day jobs and more time in my studio. Supporting an existing art organization that is open to the public would benefit the organization, as well as artists and the viewing public.
    But investing my labor, time, and attention to provide a service and product that may be instrumentalized as corporate culture perks doesn’t speak to why I’m an artist.

  • I came of age in the 1990s, and anti-corporate, DIY, punk ethos is in my cultural DNA. Overwhelmingly, I see corporations putting profits before people. Even if this program seems like an exception for those involved, it does in private what I’d rather do in public.
     
  • I feel loyal to friends—artists and small arts organizations—in San Francisco who are being priced out or evicted, or mourning the city’s declining diversity due to the influx of tech workers and their wealth. It’s a huge issue that individuals like you and I cannot singly account for—yet while my small decision to let this opportunity pass may not change anything, it at least spares me anxiety of a possible dilemma, the uncomfortableness of explaining my rationale to friends, and any self-doubt about ethics.
     

You asked why I’m motivated towards residencies like –––: it’s non-profit; the organization provides time and space for artists to be artists—they have no agenda and don’t require specific outcomes; and I feel great about their constituency—their exhibitions are public and their visitors heterogenous. Another difference is that they don’t own the work afterwards. I get to show it elsewhere, sell it and garner additional support, or live with it and change it if I like. If they do purchase the work, there’s an additional fee, as well as the honor of joining the collection of an organization that has earned artists’ esteem.
 

I don’t have all the answers; in fact, like many in the arts, I have way more questions than answers. But if you’d like to know more about references that have influenced these thoughts, the introductions and first chapters of both Ben Davis’ 9.5 Theses on Art and Class, as well as Martha Rosler’s Culture Class are worthwhile examinations of the complicated position that many contemporary artists negotiate.

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