A Gathering - at HOUSING

Curated by Kenya Freeman and Shani Strand, A Gathering - is a tribute to and inspired by, the work of Steve Cannon, a downtown icon, Black icon(oclast), and founder of A Gathering of the Tribes. Inspired by “Exqisite Poop,” an exhibition at A Gathering of the Tribes in 2012, each artist is paired with a writer who has been asked to create a written representation of an artwork for a zine that will be produced in tandem with the exhibition.

Loosing his eyesight in 1993 (the same year he founded Tribes) did not stop Mr. Cannon’s voracity for literature, fine art, activism and poetry. He opened his home on East 3rd Street to poets, artists, musicians, and anyone that wanted to share in the experience of creative exchange at Tribes. Many that stopped in over the years became regulars and often become Steve’s eye’s for reading, art, and news. Rafael was one of numerous readers, eventually Steve’s regular Friday reader from Summer of 2012 to Fall of 2015.

Earth Record (w/ sleeve) was created in October of 2019 when Sánchez was back in the studio after a two month engagement of Bathing Ritual, a performance staged as part of the live outdoor prologue segment for Rattlestick Theater’s production of Novenas for a Lost Hospital, a play about the loss of St. Vincent’s Hospital.

Whereas Bathing Ritual, as the title suggests, was an emersion into water and it’s metaphors, Earth Record (w/ sleeve) at that moment represented a departure towards the metaphors of earth and dirt as elemental connections. “In this sense the progression from working with and performing with water and then working with and creating with dirt in the studio was very visceral. And it was also psychically cleansing and transformative in both instances. In practice it is interesting that the water was performed, essentially ephemeral -flowing, and that dirt exists in a way that you can make a stand alone thing out of it. Two different ways to experience and represent material, time, and place; I am interested in the areas where these shifts occur.”

The inclusion of Earth Record in A Gathering - also finds a surprising yet appropriate reference in Stevie Wonder’s record Talking Book where the blind musician sits on the ground, his hair in corn-rows, Indian beads and a velvet kaftan quietly listening to the earth with his hands. It is worth noting that the original pressing of that album included a relief in braille of the album’s title along with the inscription, “Here is my music. It is all I have to tell you how I feel. Know that your love keeps my love strong.”

This connection was not lost on the artist as Earth Record (w/ sleeve) was offered in tribute to his friend. “Stevie Wonder’s gesture on Talking Book speaks of many things but primarily it suggests that seeing and hearing have many tactilities and have many accesses through the senses and the the earth itself is also a sensory organ, communicating and listen. Like with water, earth can signal illness and healing. When we tune in to what that is maybe that is where love connects everything; it is electric.”

The exhibition A Gathering - at HOUSING features work by Gerald Cannon, Ánima Correa, Taína Cruz, Steffani Jamison, Charles Mason lll, Emmanuel Massillon, Glendalys Medina, Nathaniel Oliver, Mitchell Reese, Elliott Jamal Robbins, Rafael Sánchez, Shani Strand

With writing from Shireen Ahmed, Sasha Bonét, Laura Brown, Octavia Bürgel, Gaby Cepeda, Sunday Fall, KJ Freeman, Quincy Flowers, Josie Roland Hodson, Brandon Drew Holmes, Bianca Rae Messinger, marcus scott williams

“His sonic-visual radar showed a visionary blip about the size of Africa rising with the speed of light somewhere on the left of the screen. He locked his sights. The image danced, sang, rocked back and forth, then turned into a huge drum. It vibrates like the Earth around the Sun, the Sun around the Galaxy, the whole Universe one pulsating rhythm inside Space. He flashed a message: EVERYTHING IS EVERYTHING!” -Steve Cannon, Groove, Bang, and Jive Around