zuky:

abagond:

Broomberg and Chanarin say their work, on show at Johannesburg’s Goodman Gallery, examines “the radical notion that prejudice might be inherent in the medium of photography itself”. They argue that early colour film was predicated on white skin: in 1977, when Jean-Luc Godard was invited on an assignment to Mozambique, he refused to use Kodak film on the grounds that the stock was inherently “racist”.

The light range was so narrow, Broomberg said, that “if you exposed film for a white kid, the black kid sitting next to him would be rendered invisible except for the whites of his eyes and teeth”. It was only when Kodak’s two biggest clients – the confectionary and furniture industries – complained that dark chocolate and dark furniture were losing out that it came up with a solution.

‘Racism’ of early colour photography | Guardian

Makes perfect sense to me. The human eye always adjusts to see people’s faces but the technology of photography developed around adjusting to white people only. You can probably dig deeper and look at the cultural institution that developed around photography for what came to be accepted as “what the camera likes” and the aesthetics of palettes and light conditions and such for more normalization of racist standards. Same can probably be said of a great deal of Eurocentric art, aesthetics, and technology in general.

"

53. So it is not that such speech acts say ‘we are anti-racists’ (and saying makes us so); rather they say ‘we are this’, whilst racism is ‘that’, so in being ‘this’ we are not ‘that’, where ‘that’ would be racist. So in saying we are raced as whites, then we are not racists, as racism operates through the unmarked nature of whiteness; or in saying we are racists, then we are not racists, as racists don’t know they are racists; or in expressing shame about racism, then we are not racists, as racists are shameless; or in saying we are positive about our racial identity, as an identity that is positive insofar as it involves a commitment to anti-racism, then we are not racists, as racists are unhappy, or in being self-critical about racism, then we are not racists, as racists are ignorant; or in saying we exist alongside others, then we are not racists, as racists see themselves as above others, and so on.

54. These statements function as claims to performativity rather than as performatives, whereby the declaration of whiteness is assumed to put in place the conditions in which racism can be transcended, or at the very least reduced in its power. Any presumption that such statements are forms of political action would be an overestimation of the power of saying, and even a performance of the very privilege that such statements claim they undo. The declarative mode, as a way of doing something, involves a fantasy of transcendence in which ‘what’ is transcended is the very thing ‘admitted to’ in the declaration: so, to put it simply, if we admit to being bad, then we show that we are good… So it is in this specific sense that I have argued that anti-racism is not performative. Or we could even say that anti-racist speech in a racist world is an ‘unhappy performative’: the conditions are not in place that would allow such ‘saying’ to ‘do’ what it ‘says’.

"

Declarations of Whiteness: The Non-Performativity of Anti-Racism, Sara Ahmed

(via moniquemallo)

Reblogging to remind myself to read the full piece. 

(via darkjez)

(Source: ourcatastrophe, via holyfuckmeinthemouth)

sirobe:

Ballerina Aesha Ash was recommended to leave the corps of the New York City Ballet because the master in chief basically said she had accomplished all she could as a Black dancer. After the decision to leave, Ash joined Alonzo King’s Lines Ballet, a company based in San Francisco, where she soared. Ash has been featured in Pointe Magazine, Dance Magazine, New York Times, and San Francisco Chronicle. She also started a blog, The Black Swan Diaries, for all those following in her footsteps to learn from her story as well as other Black dancers that share their experiences.

If you recognize her slender and poise physique, it’s because she was also the dance double for Zoe Saldana in Center Stage.

(via poemsofthedead-deactivated20120)

mikkipedia:

fyeahfeministart:

(Sorry I couldn’t find bigger photos, click them to make them bigger though)

Rebecca Belmore, Vigil, 2002 (stills from a video of the performance)

Mourning/remembrance/healing performance.

This was a direct reference to the Pickton murders (murders of Indiginous women in Vancouver), which made it a public ritual with political end. The features of the performance were: scrubbing the streets, her arms covered with names of missing women, ripping a flower through her teeth, nailing her dress to a telephone pole and tearing out of it until she was left in her underwear (as recreation of dehumanization process and sexual violence inflicted upon them), and spoke the women’s names.

Her performance brought the women alive again and simultaneously, addressed the invisibility of their absence (they were not given enough priority in the media and in police investigative efforts because of their low status in society as Indigenous women and as sex workers). 

I remember when she did this. Wrenching. So much of women’s work is this, bearing witness to the lost.

REPRESENTATION OF THE “PRIMITIVE” AMERICAN INDIAN →

adailyriot:

lakalenyu:

blackma:

We owe many iconic images of American Indians to photographer Edward S. Curtis. Growing up in Wisconsin and Minnesota, Curtis began photographing Indians in 1895 and, in 1906, was offered $75,000 by JP Morgan to continue documenting their lives.  The 1,500 resulting photographs inevitably impacted the image of Indians in the American imagination.Later it came to light that Curtis’ photographs weren’t exactly pure representations.  In some photographs, for example, he erased signs of modernity. 

Follow the source to read more and see the altered images.

[image: sepia-toned portrait of an indigenous person. They have brown skin and deep wrinkles, greying hair that appears to be about chin-length, partially covered under a check-printed(?) cloth hat. They are wearing numerous beaded necklaces and medallions. The photograph is the work of world class fuckface Edward S. Curtis.]

Fixed the link. Hate this guy. Important read. Too tired for clever commentary. Or unfragmented sentences, apparently.

Curtis not only erased signs of modernity, but also carried around clothing and wigs he though were quintessentially “native american.” This is why you’ll see photos of pueblo women wearing cider vests… or just really non-traditional style clothing to various different tribes (i.e. cider was used in clothing and what not to the tribes in the Pacific Northwest… not in the southwest or any/most other parts of the country).

People need to be cautious of the representations of Natives that they see… folks don’t realize that stereotypes and misrepresentations of Natives have been around literally since 1492. 

(via jalwhite)

kusamapyjamas:

Lip A film collaboration between Tracey Moffatt and Gary Hillberg 1999, 10 minutes, Color

It is Hollywood’s favorite role for black women: the maid. Sassy or sweet, snickeringly attentive or flippantly dismissive, the performers who play them steal every scene they are in, and Tracy Moffatt’s entertaining video collage reveals the narrow margin Hollywood has allowed black actresses to shine in. But shine they do. Giving lip is proven an art form in these scenes from 1930’s cinema to present-day movies featuring a remarkable roster of undervalued actresses and their more celebrated white costars. Moffatt and Hillberg’s rough, no-budget assembly effectively highlights with familiarity and humor the disturbing realization of how black characters and white characters still interact on screen, under Hollywood’s eternally backwards eye.

via WOMEN MAKE MOVIES | Lip

jsmooth995:

Possibly the first time I’ve ever seen a room full of Hollywood luminaries fail to have an opinion on something. (at about two minutes in)

ch-loie:

From Charles Weidman’s Lynchtown.

“Lynchtown is the chilling account of the hanging of an African-American in Omaha in the 1930s.

“It is not about the lynching so much as about mob mentality - the loss of humanity,” says Mezzacappa. “Ingeniously, Charles choreographed it so the dancers never address the audience. We see the dancers in profile only. It’s eerie. They’re like zombies who go single-mindedly about the thing they are driven to do. It’s spine tingling.”

(source)

(via kristidances)

howtobenoladarling:

(Forever Free) Elvis Lives!, 1997

by Michael Ray Charles.

(Source: howtobeterrell, via sapphrikah)

Hip-Hop Dance is Not Here for Your Entertainment.

safithomas:

I often take great umbrage with the current societal perception of hip-hop dance (breaking, popping, locking, boogaloo, party dances, rocking) nationwide as fun, vaudeville or solely entertainment. By perpetuating this myopic perspective, we end up disenfranchising the artists, disavowing its cultural significance, and denying it its rightful status as a high art.

We must remember the roots of “entertainment.” It is based on a structure from medieval times. Dancers, acrobats, singers and jousters would entertain the king. None of the other social classes had access to this level of entertainment. As time progressed, other social classes wanted to have the same level of entertainment for their amusement as well. This morphed into the industry we see today. All social casts have access to entertainment. However each art-form is viewed within a different context dependent upon the avenue of distribution. 

Something I often say to the audience post performance is that we are not here to entertain them. If they liked it or didn’t like, it is of no consequence to us. Did the piece make them think? Did it make them feel? Were they angry, sad, confused, frustrated, happy? Did it challenge their preconceived notions about the art? Did it make them reflect on their own life? Did they see themselves in someone they saw on stage? If the answer is yes, then we did our job.

Dance is meant to spark some form of thought, emotion and depth, not just wow the crowd. It is not our role to cater to the status quo, but to develop a new one. 

By pandering to the puerile sensibilities of an inept society we end up perpetuating the very disrespect for the art we abhor. Clowns are entertaining but do you want your child to grow up to be one? No. When an art-form is viewed solely within the context of entertainment it loses texture and becomes a novelty, not an art requiring thought and intellect.

It is our responsibility as choreographers to confute the status quo, not prostrate ourselves before it.

Safi A. Thomas

Artistic Director

The Hip-Hop Dance Conservatory

THIS.