Lawrence Graham-Brown: An Artist Struggling to Reconnect
Event announcement: On March 25th at 6:30pm, Aljira will host the panel discussion Belonging in My Own Skin: Understanding Depression in Black Gay Men, initiated by multimedia artist Lawrence Graham-Brown. See details at the bottom of this review.
Racism, homophobia, violent intolerance, and self-hatred, are a few of the dominant themes running through Lawrence Graham-Brown’s Disconnecting, Reconnecting...Disconnected, a solo exhibition featured at Aljira Center for Contemporary Art in Newark, New Jersey. The March 4th evening reception drew a strong gathering of curious attendees. A self-described openly gay Jamaican artist, Lawrence Graham-Brown is a multimedia artist who expresses his ideas through a folk style of painting, collage, sculptor, and performance art.
Much of Graham-Brown’s art is shocking, explicit, or uncomfortably honest. Besides his performance art piece, perhaps the most compelling artistic work was “The Wash,” a collage described in the artist’s catalog as “latex and enamel paint and collaged paper on canvas, with detergent bottles, loofah, fabric, toilet paper and paper towel tubes, dish scrubber, soap box, hand towel, body wash puff, Comet container, bird decoy, and twine.” Among a wash of pan-African colors of red, green, and yellow, and black handwritten text, this powerful collage is an historical survey of disturbing imagery ranging from sadism, slave torture, and sexual objectification, and excerpted texts or racist and homophobic ideology, slurs, and epithets. I suspect that for many, this piece will be too overwhelming to absorb in a cursory viewing.
The exhibit also featured several readymade sculptures in the form of painted television sets, again from a palette of Pan-African colors, with images of brutality and torture pasted or etched onto the screen. Several partially painted antenna arrays were hung amidst the television sets, as if tuning the sets to the History Channel of Atrocities.
A performance art piece entitled “HaHaHaHaHaa” was presented on the opening evening of the exhibit. Amid a social conditioning process which often dehumanizes and devalues males of the African Diaspora, especially those are gay, “HaHaHaHaHaa” served as a platform for this gay, Jamaican-born artist to exorcise the demons of self-loathing and shame as he discovers the peace of mind which comes from self-acceptance. In his journey to connect with himself and the greater human community, Lawrence Graham-Brown shares with us his painful, but ultimately triumphant and empowering transformation.
On March 25th at 6:30pm, in a program initiated by Graham-Brown, Aljira will host the panel discussion Belonging in My Own Skin: Understanding Depression in Black Gay Men, moderated by Dr. Jeffrey Gardere, Ph.D, along with esteemed panelists Antoine Craigwell, Journalist and Writer; Darnell L. Moore, Visiting Scholar, Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality, New York University; Taylor Siluwé, Writer and Photographer; Elder Rev. Kevin E. Taylor, Unity Fellowship Church, New Brunswick; and Gary Paul Wright, Executive Director, African American Office of Gay Concerns. This event is free and open to the public.
Disconnecting, Reconnecting...Disconnected Works by Lawrence Graham-Brown will be on exhibit until April 23rd. Aljira, a Center for Contemporary Art, is located at 591 Broad Street, Newark, NJ 07102 . Gallery hours are Wednesday–Friday from12–6 pm, and on Saturday from 11 am–4 pm. For more information, you can contact Aljira at 973 622-1600 or visit www.aljira.org.
The exhibit also featured several readymade sculptures in the form of painted television sets, again from a palette of Pan-African colors, with images of brutality and torture pasted or etched onto the screen. Several partially painted antenna arrays were hung amidst the television sets, as if tuning the sets to the History Channel of Atrocities.
A performance art piece entitled “HaHaHaHaHaa” was presented on the opening evening of the exhibit. Amid a social conditioning process which often dehumanizes and devalues males of the African Diaspora, especially those are gay, “HaHaHaHaHaa” served as a platform for this gay, Jamaican-born artist to exorcise the demons of self-loathing and shame as he discovers the peace of mind which comes from self-acceptance. In his journey to connect with himself and the greater human community, Lawrence Graham-Brown shares with us his painful, but ultimately triumphant and empowering transformation.
On March 25th at 6:30pm, in a program initiated by Graham-Brown, Aljira will host the panel discussion Belonging in My Own Skin: Understanding Depression in Black Gay Men, moderated by Dr. Jeffrey Gardere, Ph.D, along with esteemed panelists Antoine Craigwell, Journalist and Writer; Darnell L. Moore, Visiting Scholar, Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality, New York University; Taylor Siluwé, Writer and Photographer; Elder Rev. Kevin E. Taylor, Unity Fellowship Church, New Brunswick; and Gary Paul Wright, Executive Director, African American Office of Gay Concerns. This event is free and open to the public.
Disconnecting, Reconnecting...Disconnected Works by Lawrence Graham-Brown will be on exhibit until April 23rd. Aljira, a Center for Contemporary Art, is located at 591 Broad Street, Newark, NJ 07102 . Gallery hours are Wednesday–Friday from12–6 pm, and on Saturday from 11 am–4 pm. For more information, you can contact Aljira at 973 622-1600 or visit www.aljira.org.
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