Fresh Performance Chapter 2: Performing Gender

May 31, 2013June 9, 2015Leave a comment

FRESH MILK in collaboration with Damali Abrams presents Chapter 2 in the Fresh Performance Project: Performing Gender

We begin learning the rules of gender performance at birth from the compulsory colors we are dressed in to being told “girls don’t do this” or “boys don’t do that”. Performance art can be an effective tool for exaggerating the performative aspects of gender identity in order to comment on the societal limitations that come with whatever gender box we check off. Jodie Lyn-Kee-Chow and Alberta Whittle are two interdisciplinary artists who utilize performance to comment on many issues, including gender and sexuality.

Jodie invited me to her live/work space in Ridgewood, Queens on a Tuesday evening after work. Appropriately when I went to visit Jodie she was baking banana bread. Both Jodie and Alberta have performed pieces that involve distributing bananas to audience members, though in different contexts.

Jodie’s performance, Crop Killa, “references Jamaica’s once self sufficient agriculture to its economic decline partially due to loans by IMF and the World Bank in the mid 1970’s”. Alberta’s performance, Hustle de Money, is a “critique of the visual language and gender stereotypes dominant in fete [party] posters” in Barbados.

Even though Jodie and I are good friends I learned a lot about her work from this interview. Alberta and I had a long deep conversation about gender performance and the global dangers that women face daily from street harassment to rape and kidnapping.

It was enlightening speaking with both Jodie and Alberta and I have much more footage than I could possibly fit into this video. Hopefully when I edit the full-length documentary it will give viewers an opportunity to get a better sense of these two amazing artists.

Special thanks to kiza, who is based in Serbia and provided the music for this video.

– Damali Abrams

About Jodie Lyn-Kee-Chow:

Born in Manchester, Jamaica, Jodie Lyn-Kee-Chow is a multidisciplinary artist who received a BFA at University of Florida (New World School of the Arts) in 1996. In 2005 she attained an MFA from Hunter College, New York City. Her work has been exhibited and performed nationally and internationally at venues including Exit Art (NYC), Rush Arts Gallery (NYC), Amelie A. Wallace Gallery at SUNY Old Westbury College (NY), Scope Art Fair (FL), The Queens Museum of Art (NY), Third Streaming LLC (NY), Rush Arts Gallery (NYC), Open Contemporary Art Center (Beijing, China), Art Museum of the Americas (Washington, DC), A.I.R. Gallery (Brooklyn, NY), SOHO 20 (NYC), MoCADA (Brooklyn, NY), Grace Exhibition Space (Brooklyn, NY), ‘’Gwangju International Media & Performance Art Festival’’ at the Gwangju Bienalle (Gwangju, SOUTH KOREA) and Edna Manley College for Visual and Performing Arts (Kingston , JAMAICA). She is also a Rema Hort Mann award nominee and a 2012 NYFA Fellow in Interdisciplinary Art.

Through a feminine perspective Lyn-Kee-Chow uses allegories to navigate issues of the body, desire, and nature while weaving in humor, absurdity, and familiar objects. She lives and works in New York City.

About Alberta Whittle:

Alberta Whittle is a Barbadian artist, who graduated from the Masters programme at Glasgow School of Art in 2011. Whilst a student she participating in the exchange programme at Concordia University in Montreal. Since graduating, Whittle completed a commission for the Museum of London, where she presented an interactive installation, referring to migration and displacement. Whittle has undertaken numerous international residencies, including CESTA (Czech Republic), Market Gallery (Scotland), Fresh Milk (Barbados) Collective Gallery (Scotland) and Greatmore Studios (South Africa). She choreographs interactive installations, interventions and performances as site-specific artworks in public and private spaces, including at the Royal Scottish Academy and has exhibited in various solo and group shows in Europe, South Africa and the Caribbean.

In 2013, Whittle has received an award from the Royal Scottish Academy Residencies for Scotland to undertake two residencies at Hospitalfield House and at the Scottish Sculpture Workshop. In 2014, Whittle will be travelling to Norway and Johannesburg for a residency and exhibitions.

She is currently in Cape Town preparing for an exhibition at the Centre for African Studies and participating as a researcher at Joule City’s Artist Incubator Project, focusing on visual and aural culture.

Marla Botterill and Conan Masterson’s Residency: Week 3 Report

May 26, 2013May 20, 2015Leave a comment

It is always a pleasure to meet artists and see their work, last week we visited a couple of studios and also spent a lot of time in our own studio at Fresh Milk; we managed a balance of work and play. We began week 3 with a jaunt to the south east coast with artists we met at Fresh Milk: Sheena Rose and Versia Harris. After exploring a couple of beaches we visited Sheena’s studio. She had a number of projects to show us and her excitement is infectious. Versia showed us a couple of her imaginative animations. We enjoyed looking at their past and current projects and hearing about their future plans and were impressed by their work ethic. That evening the four of us went to Oistins for the famous fish market, ate an amazing meal and were joined by other FM artists Alicia Alleyne, Shanika Grimes & Mathew Kupakwashe Murrell. It was a truly memorable day.

Joscelyn Gardner arranged our second studio visit of the week with Akyem Ramsay at Gun Hill. We had the chance to see his work already in week 1 when we toured Mervyn Awon’s collection, so it was great to see more of it. There is always something exciting about seeing active work-spaces and a wide range of projects. We had a morning of stimulating conversation and viewing a mix of both 2 and 3-dimensional works and his inventive tools.

Our own studio has been productive, we continue to build puppets and have started to learn more about their respective character traits. A few of them are anxious to be introduced so we’ve included a brief description of four of them below:

Nancy Pillow: You never know where you’ll find her, but she will find you. She’s always watching.

Bargo: The constant worker-bee. Bargo longs for a moment free from work to play. Bargo also wishes to grow in size, to fit better into the world.

Jer-Rad: Never at work, always at play. Really wants to become a professional beach bum.

Speight: A self-taught dancing machine. Currently mastering the “6:30” and “wukkin-up”

We took the puppets with us on fieldtrips outside of the FM studio as well this past week. Joscelyn took us to St. Nicholas Abbey where we explored the buildings and grounds and shot some short videos with the puppets. The next day we went to Bridgetown. Jer-Rad was anxious to get to the beach (we will blame him for taking us there) so we spent a few hours at Carlisle Bay.

We also had a fun night out with Annalee and her friends. Her dogs continue to be our daily companions and self-appointed guardians. We find it hard to believe that the end of our residency is fast approaching. We have grown accustomed to the sounds of the singing frogs and the heat. We are enjoying the food & have done some “souvenir” shopping at the grocery store as we’ve become fond of Bajan pepper sauce. A lizard visits us daily for a share of any fruit we have with us for a snack. We’ve been given fig bananas, mangos, fresh coconuts, baked goods, meals, drinks, tours, catalogues & pendants. The people we’ve spent time with here are generous in many other ways as well, they give you their time, share their stories and recommend their favourite places and activities on the island. The community around FM is supportive and provides an excellent platform for the experimental way we have been working during this residency. We have one week left. The final week includes a visit to the caves and a presentation of our puppets and videos at Fresh Milk on the evening of May 30^thwhere fellow resident Mathew Kupakwashe Murrell will also be reading from his play.

FRESH MILK XI

May 25, 2013June 9, 2015Leave a comment

On Thursday May 30th at 7:00pm, local and international resident artists Matthew Kupakwashe Murrell, Marla Botterill and Conan Masterson will share works produced during the recent Fresh Milk Residency programme.

Matthew presents a reading of an excerpt from “The Brightest Red – The Life and Death of I’Akobi Maloney” and Marla and Conan showcase their collaborative video shorts and puppets.

The artists will speak about their residency experiences which will be followed by a Q&A session.

The event is free and open to the public. For more information on the residencies, view the artists’ blog entries below, and see our About page for directions to FRESH MILK. Be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter for more updates!

FRESH MILK visits Casa Tomada

May 21, 2013May 20, 2015Leave a comment

On May 13th, 2013, founder and director of Fresh Milk Annalee Davis visited Casa Tomada is São Paulo, Brazil, to present the Fresh Milk platform and review residents’ processes and development.

Founded in 2009, Casa Tomada is an independent space for practice, research and reflections of artistic nature. Concerned with the entire process, instead of focusing exclusively on the final work of art, Casa Tomada encourages discussion about emerging contemporary art, not only stimulating the development of artistic and theoretical practices motivated by shared experience, but acting as a catalyst for experiences and connections between artists, researchers, and other independent artistic initiatives. During these years, Casa Tomada organized 8 residences, 2 in partnership with Videobrasil, and one international exchange between São Paulo and London with the Delfina Foundation. Casa Tomada has also run other kinds of programs, all based on young artistic production, connections between different spaces and interdisciplinarity.

A Performative Moment – Presentation for Northern Kentucky University

May 20, 2013June 9, 2015Leave a comment

On Thursday May 16th, FRESH MILK presented a programme to group of visiting students from the department of theatre and dance at Northern Kentucky University, USA. Presentations were made by Barbadian artists Ewan Atkinson, Sheena Rose and Shanika Grimes, local playwright, actor and artist in residence Matthew Kupakwashe Murrell, our two international resident artists Marla Botterill and Conan Masterson, and our off-site resident artist Damali Abrams who joined us via skype. All of the participants engaged in discussion with the students on performance, and the many forms it can take in the arts.

All photographs taken by Mark King.