This week, Felicia R.Lee, journalist for the New
York Times, did a piece on a talented group of young people in Dumbo ,Brooklyn. "HowDoYouSayYaminAfrican?"Or Yams for short is an up and coming
art collective comprised almost exclusively of queer and black artists. This
band of 38 musicians, poets,
actors, writers and visual artists are from around the world (from
places such as Seattle, Paris, Edmonton, Alberta, and Los Angeles ), and
have taken on the task of doing their very first piece of art for public
consumption. The group will showcase on a “distinguished international stage —
nothing less than the 2014 Whitney Museum Biennial— with a digital film in operatic form”. The project
is named “Good Stock on the Dimension Floor, “and it looks to study how race
affects black identity(especially in “post racial” America), The tangible
description by Lee of the work is “Many sets are sculptural installations; the
original score is spoken, chanted, sung and screamed.” This highly anticipated work will start its debut
on March 7.
The
reason that this story is so incredible is that it focuses on many artists who identify
as women of color, in addition to some women being queer. The project itself
screams of a study of race relations in America, a hot-button subject,
especially when we consider the atrocities that have been perpetuated against
women of color (especially black women) of late. Also
in this story the journalists takes the seeming lack of diversity in certain
art scenes, revealing something that many people were already aware of (due to
the dearth of art featuring and by women of color).Globally there is still a
certain amount of reluctance on the part of the art world to appreciate and
showcase women’s of color’s more drastic art pieces, and by doing so continue
to silent rich, diverse voices, and stories that could change the world.
