Brendan Fernandes: Stand Taller II
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Three large-scale sculptures by multidisciplinary artist Brendan Fernandes (b. 1979, Nairobi, Kenya) will be installed in the Kasmin Sculpture Garden from January 12, 2023. Presented as an extension of Shades of Daphne, which runs from January 12 – February 22, 2023, at 509 West 27th Street, the exhibition employs deconstructed impressions of the body as a framework for institutional critique, addressing issues of race, queer culture, migration, and collective movement. The exhibition will be activated by site-specific, commissioned dance-based performances that blend elements of traditional ballet, improvised dance movements and queer club culture, manifested with the surging collective energy of political protest. Costumes designed by Nobis.
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Fernandes’ practice is rooted in the principles of collaboration and fostering solidarity. Developing on the artist’s Stand Tall series, first commissioned by the University of Buffalo Art Galleries, Buffalo, Stand Taller II consists of monumental iron translations of the wire armatures found in museological displays of African masks. Reaching over six feet in height, the sculptures are themselves reminiscent of figures. Performers will activate the sculptures while wearing textiles that incorporate an optically aggressive magenta and blue plaid, referencing fabrics that were imported to Kenya during British colonial rule. These patterns, a residue of cultural manipulation, remain in use in contemporary Massai practice as a non-verbal warning to fend off predators in the wild. Also included are patterns drawn from “Razzle Dazzle,” a style used by marine military in WWII that the artist compares to the flashing of police lights. By reasserting and performing the presence of the body within the display of African art objects, Fernandes probes the traces of their original performers, calling into question the provenance and authenticity of the practice of museum collection, its histories, and its authority on the objects collected.
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Recent institutional performances by Fernandes include those at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The J Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles; The Noguchi Museum, New York; The Richmond Art Gallery, Richmond, Canada; and The National Gallery of Canada, Ontario, Canada. New commissions are upcoming at The Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia; The DR Vocal Ensemble, Copenhagen, Denmark; and Munch Museum, Oslo, Norway.
Brendan Fernandes is an internationally recognized Canadian artist working at the intersection of dance and visual arts. He is a graduate of the Whitney Independent Study Program (2007) and a recipient of a Robert Rauschenberg Fellowship (2014). In 2010, he was shortlisted for the Sobey Art Award, and is the recipient of a prestigious 2017 Canada Council New Chapters grant. Brendan is also the recipient of the Artadia Award (2019), a Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship (2020) and a Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation grant (2019). His projects have shown at the 2019 Whitney Biennial (New York); the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (New York); the Museum of Modern Art (New York); The Getty Museum (Los Angeles); the National Gallery of Canada (Ottawa); MAC (Montreal); among a great many others. He is currently Assistant Professor at Northwestern University and represented by Monique Meloche Gallery in Chicago.
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