Subtitled “An American City,” this multipart triennial employs Cleveland as a model and a platform with which to consider how urban transformation and sociopolitical forces define the contemporary experience and cultural production of a city. More than 55 artists feature in an extensive lineup of experimental events, projects, and site-specific installations. We list just a few highlights below.
“Canvas City”
Revisiting Cleveland Area Arts Council’s 1973 public art effort, City Canvas, which blanketed the city’s downtown in vibrant murals, this project revives one of its key pieces, abstract painter Julian Stanczak’s mural, at its original site on Winton Manor. The re-created mural joins newly commissioned outdoor works by contemporary artists (Kay Rosen, Sarah Morris, and Odili Donald Odita) that examine the relationship between abstraction and consumer culture.
Michael Rakowitz “A Color Removed”
As a response to the fatal police shooting in 2014 of 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who was holding a toy gun with its orange safety cap removed, the Chicago-based artist’s project aims to rid Cleveland of all orange-colored objects. Displayed and catalogued at SPACES Gallery, these articles—toys, clothing, household items—encourage viewers to contemplate living in a society without the right to safety.
FRONT Film Program
Held in a specially built theater inside Crane Gallery, this array of videos and films touches on the social and economic realities of global cities. On the program are works by an international cast of contemporary artists including Ohio native Jennifer Reeder, Turkey’s Erkan Özgen, Paris-based Eric Baudelaire, and China’s Cheng Ran.
Yinka Shonibare “The American Library”
In this new work, the Nigerian-born, Britain-based artist celebrates how a nation is enriched by immigration with an installation of open bookcases housing some 6,000 books, each wrapped in graphic African textiles and stamped in gold with the name of an immigrant who has contributed greatly to American culture.
Candice Breitz, “Love Story” (2016).
Commissioned by the National Gallery of Victoria, Outset Germany + Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg. Installation View: South African Pavilion, Venice Biennale 2017. Photograph: Andrea Rossetti. Courtesy: Goodman Gallery, Kaufmann Repetto + KOW.
