Tag: International Residency

Fresh Milk welcomes Kate Keohane to the platform

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Fresh Milk is pleased to welcome art historian & PhD candidate at the University of St Andrews, Scotland, Kate Keohane to the platform from August 28 – September 23, 2017.

Kate, whose research focuses on complicating the effect of globalisation in contemporary creative fields – particularly the way ‘paradises’ are framed in the cultural imaginary with reference to the use of the Caribbean landscape in global contemporary art – sees this residency as an opportunity to spend time in the region, getting a sense of one of the islands she is investigating and learning about the wider Caribbean. She will also be utilizing the collection in the Colleen Lewis Reading Room for research towards her thesis.

About Kate Keohane:

Kate Keohane is a PhD candidate in History of Art at the University of St Andrews, Scotland. As part of an international EU-LAC project which studies community museums, her work considers the staging and circulation of the Caribbean landscape in contemporary art. Through the sustained analysis of artists working from outside and within the region, and the ideas of writers and theorists of the Caribbean, including Édouard Glissant, Derek Walcott, Paul Gilroy and Stuart Hall, her thesis hopes to trouble the narrative surrounding conceptions of the ‘contemporary’ and the effects of globalisation on creative fields. 

Nyugen Smith’s Residency – Final Blog Post

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US-based interdisciplinary artist Nyugen Smith shares his final blog post about his recently completed residency at Fresh Milk. Nyugen’s last post takes the form of poetic musings, looking at experiences he had in Barbados and how they informed his views and his work. Further images and texts expanding on some of his performance pieces – including an intervention held at the Barbados Museum and Historical Society in collaboration with Barbadian artist Llanor Alleyne and a live performance done at FRESH MILK XXI – will follow. Read more here:

FRESH MILK XXI – Photo by Dondré Trotman

Day 26

Everyday –
Rising just after the sun
after four maybe 5 hours of rest,
my body follows mind into action
as I ask the day for all that’s good.

I am going home.
-soon.
it was about a month of
open receptors
toward the external
and internal.
what has happened
in the twenty-eight days?
what have I learned?
what have I given
shared
created
destroyed

in the process?

I remembered to rest
to eat well
to drink plenty water
to carry water

-each day-

the sun showered bodies
moving
in the outdoors.
some sought shade in bush
-in ways their DNA recalled.
i’m still thinking about them
side
by
sturdy-bodied
side.

body of man + body of woman

quiet they sat
on concrete curved
holding the walk way.

their faces leaned close
to the broad leaves
and more leaves
rose above their heights and blocked light.

they were cooled.
~as if by blue light~
they were cooled.

just across the bridge
they were
a little distance from the fairchild bus depot-
where a steady stream
of loading and unloading

travelers

jostled to the tune
of signature horns
and conductors who
shouted down
man woman child
to the chorus of
multiple destinations.

load ’em up
load ’em up.

the twin seats always had three
and the ledge behind
the passenger riding shotgun
usually sat two.
the conductor stood
hunched over perspiring heads
they inhaled (usually) him
sometimes her ~(only once I saw)~

collecting crumpled cash
handed over
like the act
was powered by contempt
or ambivalence
or coolness
like the bills had little value
no matter the color.

though the rush
of the journey
in and out of town
fueled my spirit and
grounded the work
made there and
created sparks for more to come,
i was ready to be home.

**my residency culminated with a new performance in the fresh milk studio that was informed by much of what i had learned and experienced during my time in barbados. i also created and intervention at the barbados museum and historical society in collaboration with bajan artist, llanor alleyne. images of both are being organized to be coupled with writing and will be uploaded to my website soon**

thank you to the fresh milk team for the wonderful experience and for the invaluable network and resources provided. i am eternally grateful!
-One Love

___________________

This residency is supported by the Leonore Annenberg Fellowship Fund for the Performing and Visual Arts

Nyugen Smith’s Residency – Third Blog Post

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US-based interdisciplinary artist Nyugen Smith shares his third blog post about his recently completed residency at Fresh Milk. Nyugen reflects on part of his time in Barbados and the sensitivity of some of the issues he is attempting to unpack through his work, as he begins to navigate the history of the island in conjunction with the contemporary realities and nuances of its complex culture. Read more below:

___________________________

Day 6

I pity them greatly but I must be mum,
For how could we do without sugar and rum?
-William Cowper

Every night is a time to reflect on the events of that day, yesterday, and the day before that.

Today (6/9/17) is one day short of a week that I have been here in this place where there weren’t many places for a runaway to hide. Flat land. Coral rock holding points of pressure always a reminder that one day, almost all of this, if not the highest point of this mass, will look upwards to refractions of light filtered by a mix of salt and fresh water. I see shells at my feet in places that provide an overview of flowering fields, marveling at the magic produced by the perfect length of day. There isn’t much soil here. So I’ve heard. I couldn’t help but wonder how one buries the dead. My mind ran through the file of flora and fauna my eyes have registered since landing. To think that their roots do not run deep. Or maybe they possess the strength and capacity to carve their way through the limestone floor because they must.

I wondered. Every time that I see banks of this almost rock that flank the roads I travel, I want to measure the depth of dirt that rests atop like frosting on sponge cake slices. I am curious. Six or seven inches of soil is all it takes for “white gold” to situate itself in this part of what Andrea Stuart referred to as a “European world”, to the south and west of England’s winter.

…continued on 7/6/17 post-residency…

“It’s Complicated”… is a phrase that became popular on social media platforms as a way to describe relationships between two individuals when either one or both parties dance between acknowledging the other as a romantic/committed partner and not doing so. This could be due to reasons that may or may not include external pressures, unresolved prior romantic/committed relationships, apprehension to absorb one another’s “baggage”, lingering questions regarding long-term effects on one’s social status, fear of personal sacrifices that are inevitiable for the relationship to work, and or unaddressed psychological trauma that hinders one or both parties from being able to commit to the “long-haul” together.

As a guest in Barbados, the home of 285,750 people, I quickly became aware of topics of conversation that if spoken of, would complicate the weather underground and perhaps prompt the removal of lavalier microphones with a muttering of “we’re done here…” This early awareness was not derived from my own assumptions or conclusion drawn from tangential musings, but directly spoken to me by Bajan citizens. There was no mistaking the message bottled in the words…

f-f-f-f-f-f-fear
sen-s-s-s-s-sitive
am-m-m-m-ne-e-e-e-sia
e-e-era-a-a-sure
den-i-i-i-ial
protective-v-v-ve
in-secur-r-r-r-re
sus-s-s-spicion

…these words are like the togetherness of flies on a pile of shit
bothered by strong breeze
and boots barely too close.

bothered for good reason.
if spoken (topics) they do a number of things:

they
carry a threat of a future removal of the flies’ feast

they
add pressure that spreads the feast thin over a wider area, making it easier for more to take part in the spoils

they
carry the scent across a distance simultaneously attracting more to buzz about in the mess and causes others to close off parts of themselves as to not absorb any

they
smear the pile taking with them a trail wherever they go. at least – a small sample ends up in the home of the hot stepper

Despite the words of caution and warnings, I, the guest, stepped in the pile.
I, the guest, was smearing, spreading, and stirring up the mess with the work I was doing.
There was one instance in particular where I was asked to stop.

To speak the name,
Barbados
is to spray the air
with a mist of sea salt and
the smell of green-
for bush and deep waters are never far.

To speak its name
is to swaddle the body with hospitality
and rock it with musical vibrations of the region.

To speak its name
is to draw from its wells of intellectual tradition.

But you cannot speak the name,
Barbados
without the bitter taste of
black death soaked
in the juice of Saccharum officinarum
lingering on lips
warmed by the Caribbean sun.

For sugarcane to have earned the moniker “white gold”, scientific means had to have been employed to develop and improve its quality, while maximizing its production. There were people at the helm of this scientific research. Parallel to this timeline that ensured the success and longevity of the sugarcane industry, existed a systematically constructed labor force comprised of enslaved Africans and their descendants. The success of the plantation system (slavery) in Barbados was a model for the colonies in North America. As sugarcane was and is selectively bred, enslaved Africans and their descendants born into slavery in Barbados were also bought and sold-their value determined by their physical attributes and skills. I am intrigued by the historical and contemporary societal relationships between the two and plan to investigate this and the sensitivity of these matters more in my practice.

Engaging in conversations about this, is not for the ill-prepared. Preparation is a must. Patience must be had, composure maintained and its important for all engaged parties to be present with a willingness to bridge gaps of understanding within “the complicated”. If not now… when?

____________________________

This residency is supported by the Leonore Annenberg Fellowship Fund for the Performing and Visual Arts

drea brown’s Residency – Final Blog Post

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US-based poet drea brown shares her final blog post about her Fresh Milk residency, which took place from April 19 – May 10, 2017 as part of a new partnership between  Fresh Milk  and the John L. Warfield Center for African and African American Studies at the University of Texas in Austin. Although there is a kind of finality in her writing this closing blog, it also comes with the knowledge that her time in Barbados was the start of something special; what she learned and the bonds she formed are sure to bring her back to the island in the future. Read more below:

I’ll begin with a confession. I think it has taken so long to write this final blog because in doing so, I have to admit the world I’ve returned to, full of its own responsibilities, is not a longwinded dream that I will wake from rocking in a chair on porch surrounded by blues and beauty, and the occasional mooing cow.

My last week of Fresh Milk was filled with serenity and laughter, with art and bold amazing voices. I found myself waking with pieces of poems in my mouth that stumbled onto scraps of napkins while coffee brewed. I rambled to Fresh Milk artists/team about all of these imaginings, all of these stories that kept unraveling. I shed layers and layers of fear, and leaned into the encouragement, and openness of those I’d come to cherish and respect.

A few days before leaving Barbados, I went to the Barbados Community College BFA portfolio art show, a major event in town, and walked around with my mouth gaped in a amazement from the intense beauty on those walls, the dismantling of taboo and stereotype, inquiries of identity, music, color, masculinities, sisterhood.  That night, those walls, the sounds, the film shorts, still buzz in my head. I am eagerly anticipating what comes next for the bold emerging artists.

The audience at FRESH MILK XX. Photo by Dondré Trotman (http://dondretrotman.com)
Kraig Yearwood speaking about his residency at FRESH MILK XX. Photo by Dondré Trotman (http://dondretrotman.com)
drea brown during her poetry reading at FRESH MILK XX. Photo by Dondré Trotman (http://dondretrotman.com)
The audience at FRESH MILK XX. Photo by Dondré Trotman (http://dondretrotman.com)
drea brown during her poetry reading at FRESH MILK XX. Photo by Dondré Trotman (http://dondretrotman.com)

My last evening with Fresh Milk was also the night of artist talks and a gallery walk. Kraig Yearwood’s creations and residency experiments lined the walls and posed in corners. And, I was so inspired by the way he let go, and let his art decide the journey. There was such truth in that, surrendering to the will of the work. I was learning something similar, how to listen, how to see, and let my hands move as they desired. I read from new poems that night, and there were moments where I found myself surprised by the words I’d written, but they needed to be shared. And there is more to come.

I write this knowing I will be back. It feels impossible not to return. There’s more to be done.

__________________

This residency is supported by the John L. Warfield Center for African and African American Studies

Letitia Pratt’s Residency – Third Blog Post

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Bahamian writer Letitia Pratt shares her third blog post about her Fresh Milk residency. This week, Letitia took the time to get out of her own head and experience Barbados is different ways to overcome her writer’s block. This exploration, coupled with inspiration gleaned from reading Shivanee Ramlochan‘s ‘Everyone Knows I am a Haunting’ proved to be the breakthrough she needed to continue writing about the folkloric Hag Woman in her poetry. Read more here:

This week, I went exploring. Stir crazy from the isolation of my own head, I decided to give myself a break and travel all over the island. I thought it would be good to do this because I was having trouble formulating the narrative of my poem, and a break was necessary to gather my thoughts.

My week started off with an island tour that Natalie McGuire took Nyugen and I on. We were able to watch the island come alive through her lead. With good company, I allowed the spirit of the island to speak to me. We explored caves and cavernous cliffs that overlooked the sea at the east and north points of the island. It was a beautiful thing to experience, and from the natural beauty of this place, I was able to find some melody to my writing. But it wasn’t quite there yet.

During the week I decided to go walking around in Bridgetown. The bustling activity of the place immediately overwhelmed me. It was quite different from the silent stillness of Walkers Dairy and reminded me of the hullabaloo of Downtown Nassau. Because of this, I found it kind of homey as I walked through the busy crowds that were ambling towards shops. I visited libraries, souvenir shops, produce markets, and stalls on Swan Street. The Bridgetown atmosphere was definitely invigorating, but did not unblock the words I needed for the piece.

Feeling frustrated I confided in Sonia Williams, a Barbadian performance artist, theatre director, writer, and educator in Theatre Arts at the University of the West Indies Cave Hill Campus, about the construction of my Hag Woman character. She suggested, because the character was so connected to the woods and trees of her environment, that I immerse myself in the woodsy areas of Barbados for inspiration. So one morning, pulling on my T-Shirt and very long jeans, I ventured into the woodsy trees that surrounded Walkers dairy. The stillness of these woods inspired some of the words for my poem. I was able to indulge in what my protagonist would be able to see when she transforms herself, and her voice came passionately.

When I left the woods I felt reassured. I knew the words were coming. But I needed a bit more help, and Annalee was able to provide some for me. Later on in the day, she gave me a copy of Everybody Knows I am Haunting by Trinidadian writer Shivanee Ramlochan. Her words were vivid enough to fuel dreams and spark my imagination. The story of the Hag Woman comes from the inspiration I gathered from reading this book. It came from those dreams.

After all the exploring, all the reading, my piece began to take on form. I was delighted. Again, I would like to thank Annalee and Katherine for letting me indulge in this amazing experience here at Fresh Milk. The Hag Woman and I are immensely grateful.