Shannon Taggart, Table-tipping workshop with mediums Reverend Jane and Chris Howarth. Erie, Pennsylvania, 2014. © Shannon Taggart. Courtesy of the Artist.

Séance: Photographs by Shannon Taggart

Albin O. Kuhn Library Gallery: August 31 to December 17, 2021

For the past twenty years, American artist Shannon Taggart (born 1975) has documented Spiritualist practices and communities in the United States, England, and Europe. The resulting body of work, Séance, examines the relationship of Spiritualism to human celebrity, its connections to art, science, and technology, and its intrinsic bond with the medium of photography. This exhibition presents forty-seven haunting images from the series, revealing the emotional, psychological, and physical dimensions of Spiritualism in the 21st century.

Spiritualism is a religion born in nineteenth-century America whose adherents believe in communication with spirits, often transmitted through the figure of a medium who receives psychic messages from the dead. Not coincidentally, photography was invented at the same historical moment, when the new technology was revered for its ability to faithfully record reality. Photography thus became a preferred medium of scientific documentation capable of rendering invisible phenomena visible, such as in astronomical photography, X-rays, and microscopy. For Spiritualists, photography was a tool for revealing the existence of spirits, but for non-believers the ghostly forms that materialized in spirit photographs proved nothing more than darkroom trickery. While this double-sided coin of belief and skepticism haunts the histories of both photography and Spiritualism, Taggart’s photographs do not take sides. The images that comprise Séance are characterized by open-mindedness and empathy toward their subjects, many of whom are brought to Spiritualism through grief and a desire to reconnect with lost loved ones.

The photographs on display explore the communities and phenomena associated with Spiritualism, including séance circles, mediumship, and the objects and technological devices used to aid communication with spirits. Among the most arresting images are those that chart the artist’s quest to capture ectoplasm, a supernatural substance that is paradoxically both spiritual and material. Often made in darkened rooms, the photographs are characterized by otherworldly blurs, chance flares and orbs, and entrancing portraits cast in glowing colors. Taking on the role of participant observer, Taggart bears witness with her camera to an unseen world of belief lying just beyond the fringes of everyday reality.

© Eric J. Smith, A Portrait of Zaina. Photographed on behalf of World Bicycle Relief for Givewith LLC in 2019.

LACP’s Seventh Annual Members’ Exhibition

Online Exhibition: August 19 to October 19, 2021

The Los Angeles Center of Photography is pleased to announce LACP’s Seventh Annual Members’ Exhibition. This will be an online exhibition and will run from August 19 – October 19, 2021. A free virtual opening night reception is scheduled for Thursday, August 19, 5 pm PST. The juror, Dr. LeRonn Brooks, Associate Curator for Modern and Contemporary Collections at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles, selected images based on creativity, originality, and quality. The opening night online reception is a public event where Dr. Brooks and several prize winners will speak.

© Martyna Szczesna, courtesy The Watermill Center.

CROSSROADS at The Watermill Center, NY

The Watermill Center, NY: July 31 to August 8, 2021

The Watermill Center is pleased to present CROSSROADS: The Watermill Center Summer Festival, a week-long gathering to consider the meaning of ritual, healing, and hope at this moment in time, led by Carrie Mae Weems, in collaboration with Robert Wilson. The festival, running from July 31 through August 8, affirms The Center’s dedication to offering artists time, space, and freedom to create while revealing artistic processes to the broader community. CROSSROADS is presented by Van Cleef & Arpels.

An invitation from Carrie Mae Weems and Robert Wilson for audiences to ‘meet at the Crossroads,’ the festival assembles vital voices and viewpoints to mark a pivotal moment in history, together. CROSSROADS will be documented by Weems for a new body of work. The programmed events, including installations, spiritual practices, and performances throughout the grounds, offer access to an active creative process.

Robert Wilson comments, “This summer is about building community. Engaging the community is vital to The Watermill Center, and CROSSROADS is a new and exciting chance to continue doing so. It will be nothing like what we have done before.”

“The Watermill Center has always been a space to not only create art but to create community,” says The Center’s Managing Director, Elise Herget. “After a year of reduced activity and inevitable programming shifts, our focus is on bringing the creative community together again. Our highly anticipated annual summer benefit was without exception a major success, yet it has not always told our full story. The Summer Festival and our summer residencies reinforce The Watermill Center as a laboratory for artists. The programs echo what we do throughout the year: inviting the public into the creative process.“

CROSSROADS will include a series of performances, concerts, film screenings, and installations throughout The Center’s 10-acre property. Proceeds from ticket sales go towards The Center’s year-round Artist Residency and Education Programs. Tickets will be available to purchase on The Watermill Center’s website. Limited quantities are available.

Events:

First Saturday Lite with John Edmonds

The Brooklyn Museum Plaza

Saturday August 7

2:00pm – 6:00pm

Outdoor is Free, Galleries need reserve tickets, $16

Artist John Edmonds hosts this month’s First Saturday Lite—a low-key, free outdoor afternoon amplifying culture and community in our borough—with a dynamic lineup celebrating the exuberance and artistry of the Caribbean diaspora. On the plaza, DJ Lovaboi kicks off the afternoon with soca accompanied by Michael the Pannist, and TYGAPAW offers a rich synthesis of Dancehall and Afrobeats. In our backyard Biergarten, catch a set from djFRiTZo and a special performance by harpist Brandee Younger presented by Carnegie Hall Citywide.

Participate in a photo booth designed by the artist to honor the closing of our special exhibition John Edmonds: A Sidelong Glance, plus get a signed copy of Edmonds’s monograph Higher. Throughout the day, shop and snack at the Brooklyn Pop-Up Market, which is spotlighting artists and vendors of the Caribbean diaspora.

Art History from Home: Art and Social Change

The Whitney Museum, Online via Zoom

Tuesday August 10

6:00pm

Free with registration

This series of online talks by the Whitney’s Joan Tisch Teaching Fellows highlights works in the Museum’s collection and current exhibitions to illuminate critical topics in American art from 1900 to the present. During each thirty-minute session, participants are invited to comment and ask questions through a moderated chat for a fifteen-minute Q&A following the talk. Sessions are available live only, Tuesdays at 6 pm and Thursdays at 12 pm, but topics and speakers do periodically repeat. Check back here for more sessions added regularly.

Art exists in relation to its particular social moment. Whether representing the current reality or leveraging its power to challenge cultural narratives, it can inspire emotional responses and critical thinking in a way distinct from traditional political methods. Through work in the Whitney’s collection, we will explore the different roles art has played in the United States during the twentieth century, addressing issues from immigration to economic justice to sexism and racism.

Ayanna Dozier is an artist, lecturer, curator, and scholar. She recently completed her Ph.D. in art history and communication studies at McGill University. She is the author of the 33 ⅓ book on Janet Jackson’s The Velvet Rope. She is currently a Joan Tisch Teaching Fellow at the Whitney and a lecturer in the department of communication and media studies at Fordham University.

100 Years/100 Women Conversation Series

The Met, NY

Friday August 13

12:00pm – 1:00pm

Free, registration is not required

Join The Met and Park Avenue Armory for a series of conversations about the 100 Years | 100 Women project with the participants. The project invited one hundred artists, activists, scholars, students, and community leaders to respond to the centennial and complex legacy of the 19th Amendment, which gave some women the right to vote. Each conversation in this series features a group of participants exploring specific topics that resonate with the project, including uplifting underrepresented stories of women, art and disability advocacy, the past and future of women of color in film and television, and more.

One of The Met’s Civic Practice Partnership artists in residence, Toshi Reagon, participated in the project and is part of these conversations.