More people are showing up by the hour as old resident artist, interns and volunteers appear to help with Carnival. We have been told repeatedly that we aught not feel obligated to help with Carnival, as it is something independent of our official time at Elsewhere. If we want to help out we are more than welcome but since we have to propose a project on Tuesday it “may be prudent” to try our best to simply try and explore the museum and see where that takes us.
Now of course this is no easy task. It is an all too familiar feeling here that reminds me of time spent at Gallery 5 and the All the Saints Theater Company in Richmond. A lot of energy, a lot of personality, singing and theatrics…even before the performance! And we have a general will to help but at the same time a conflicting sense to hang back, chill and survey. There is no rest here.
Jennida and I took a small walk around the immediate area and ended up at a small brewpub called Natty Green’s, which has an awesome hot dog and rather good craft brews. Across from Natty Green’s is a plaque and bust dedicated to Martin Luther King Jr. The plaque tells that King was scheduled to arrive for a speech in Greensboro but at the last minute cancelled his plans and stayed in Memphis where he was later shot and killed.
After dinner we returned to Elsewhere and entered into the vortex that is the carnival. I ended up repurposing the Tree Room and currated a video installation using a two channel video system and a series of mirrors stacked, tucked, leaned and angled all around the room in order to magnify, split and fracture the two images. I had fun.
I am trying really hard to figure out what to do with the “black history museum” that is night next to our desk spaces. You see there are all of these items that inhabit Elsewhere and some are quite random. Sometimes exploring and curating rooms and areas involve collecting items and organizing them. Sometimes it is as simple as by type, such as cloth, or machine. Sometimes is takes form of collecting all the books in the library and grouping them by the color of the spine. There is no rhyme or reason just to it just a temporary sort of happen stance. Once there was the chaos of a thrift store untouched. Now there is the chaos masquerading as a movable investigation and re-imagining. So anyway there is one place that is called the natural history museum that has all sorts of items that are related to animals, plants and living things in general. Unfortunately someone constructed a black history museum, which has a variety of things that are black in color. Yes there are things that relate to black or African American culture but largely not. And so I am left with an unrelenting dissatisfaction of not understanding and not knowing weather or not there was a purposeful, thoughtful, or even passionate intention for this chaos masquerading as the black history museum. And to make matters worse…. no one else seems to know either. Apparently it is so haphazard that anyone who encounters it tries to avoid it or ignore it because it doesn’t make any sense nor does it attempt to. Even I who keeps gravitating towards it hope to find what ultimately (I fear) isn’t there. So I guess I feel like I being insulted- and I may be the most forgiving mind in regard to this piece. Well maybe I’ll tear it down. But there’s carnival so I guess I’ll just avoid it for now. ;)
