Exhibition Review: Genevieve Gaignard’s “A Long Way From Home”
Genevieve Gaignard, "White Lies,” courtesy of the artist and Vielmetter Los Angeles © Megan Haley
By Lana Nauphal
Genevieve Gaignard’s exhibition “A Long Way From Home” opened on Aug. 27 with Vielmetter Los Angeles, right in the midst of a long, painful summer of racial unrest— and Gaignard’s work encapsulates the burning emotions of those months of protests. Collages made with vintage wallpaper and photographs cut out of old Ebony and Life magazines adorn the walls of a 1960s-style parlor room, as Gaignard bridges our current moment's fight for racial equality to that of the civil rights movement. Beneath the veneer of bright colors and flowery patterns, “A Long Way From Home” is biting and angry; it expresses a deep weariness at a violent history we continue to repeat, and reminds us that this summer’s calls for, and subsequent promises of change are nothing new, but are incessant cries, and tired lies, that have yet to take tangible form.
Walking into the exhibition’s installation room, with its dark green motif wallpaper and midcentury wooden furniture, feels like taking a step back in time. Icons of the civil rights movement such as Martin Luther King Jr. and President John F. Kennedy are prominently featured on the walls, and vintage luggage, frames, and rag dolls are strewn about the room. However, there is also a distinctly modern feel to the installation: the baby pink hues and sans serif fonts of certain works are familiar to the millennial eye, and fit our 21st century Instagram aesthetic perfectly.
Genevieve Gaignard, "Salty Karens,” courtesy of the artist and Vielmetter Los Angeles © Megan Haley
Gaignard has melded both of these cultural periods together in one embodied space in order to elucidate the historical context of this summer’s Black Lives Matter protests, while also highlighting their unique, era-specific characteristics. “Disinfect Our Politics,” for example, references the current global pandemic, which has disproportionately affected Black communities; in “Salty Karens,” Gaignard plays on the slang term ‘Karen,’ which has been widely popularized in 2020 to call out racist white women who weaponize their privilege against Black people.
Genevieve Gaignard, "A Long Way From Home,” MCLA Gallery 51 installation view, courtesy of the artist and Vielmetter Los Angeles © Megan Haley
The installation room feels loud, almost alive—it’s as if you can hear the characters in the collages talking to each other, and the pieces themselves, from the art to the furniture, engage with one another across the space. The different personages decorating the walls, which were originally displayed on separate pages in separate magazines, are brought together at Gaignard’s hands and forced into conversation. The majority of these interactions between Black and white cut-out figurines end up revealing white complacency and denial: in “White Lies,” Martin Luther King Jr. preaches with a raised arm at a white woman who, all dolled up and frolicking through a field of flowers, couldn’t care less.
Genevieve Gaignard, "A Long Way From Home,” MCLA Gallery 51 installation view, courtesy of the artist and Vielmetter Los Angeles © Megan Haley
As the exhibition’s title suggests, “A Long Way From Home,” explores and questions the meaning of home. This project is, in a way, a homecoming for Los Angeles-based Gaignard, who created these pieces as an artist-in-residence at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, near where she grew up— but its moniker suggests a disconnect. In this mixing of eras and juxtaposition of characters, there is a searching, and a yearning, for solid ground, for what a home represents: comfort, support, love. A safe space that protects you from the world outside. Neither the civil rights movement nor this summer’s months-long protests have yet to culminate in a true sense of safety for Black individuals in this country, and in that sense, America is still a long way from home.
“A Long Way From Home” is available for viewing both online and in person at MCLA Gallery 51 until December 7. You can visit the online exhibition here and see the installation room here.
