Queens Museum launches its Spring Exhibitions in grand style on Sunday, May 19, at 1 pm. The four-hour event includes artist-led walkthroughs, a reception, and drop-in family art making.
Admission is free, but organizers request that attendees RSVP here.
Let’s get into the shows, first. Here’s more information.
Lyle Asthon Harris’s Our first and last love mixes photographs and installations to explore the artist’s critical examination of identity and self-portraiture while tracing central themes and formal approaches in his work of the last 35 years.
Born in the Bronx in 1965, Harris was raised in Tanzania and New York. He has an MFA from the California Institute of the Arts and attended the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program. The current teacher at NYU has pieces in permanent collections at The Museum of Modern Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and The Studio Museum in Harlem.
Cameron A. Granger’s 9999 uses the framework of video games and magic to imagine an alternative method of liberation for Black communities from the compounding effects of allegedly racist urban planning.
Born in Cleveland in 1993, Granger is an In Situ Artist Fellow at Queens Museum. His work has been in solo exhibitions at No Place Gallery, Columbus, OH; Ortega y Gasset Projects, Brooklyn (2019); and Vox Populi, Philadelphia (2018). He’s also had pieces in group shows at MoMA PS1, Long Island City; Jack Shainman The School, Kinderhook, NY; and The Bemis Center for the Arts, Omaha, NE.
Nsenga Knight’s Close to Home installation honors domestic space as a custodian of cultural and spiritual traditions. Modeled after the artist’s family residences, the piece’s eclectic atmosphere reflects the historic and cosmopolitan. Knight is also an In Situ Artist Fellow at the Queens Museum. The Brooklyn-born, Caribbean-American, Muslim artist earned an MFA from University of Pennsylvania and a BA from Howard University. She has exhibited her work in Brooklyn, Cairo, Houston, and Manhattan.
Catalina Schliebener Muñoz’s Buenos Vecinos confronts Walt Disney’s animated films “Saludos Amigos” (1942) and “Los Tres Caballeros” (1944). Both emerged from state-sponsored research trips to South and Central America as part of The Good Neighbor Policy, which sought to discourage Nazi influence and improve the U.S.’s image in Latin America.
Born in Chile in 1980, Schliebener Muñoz is an In Situ Artist Fellow at Queens Museum with a Bachelor of Philosophy and a Bachelor of Visual Arts from the Universidad de Arte y Ciencias Sociales in Santiago, Chile. She has exhibited in Boston, Manhattan, Pittsburgh, Santiago, and the Bronx.
Cas Holman’s Prototyping Play explores the intersection of art making and play.
Born in 1974, Holman has been designing playthings and playspaces for two decades, encouraging exploration, imagination, and collaboration. Her company, Heroes Will Rise, creates intuitive toys, including the award-winning Rigamajig, a line of playful building kits used in schools and public spaces worldwide.
Now let’s look at the schedule.
1 pm to 4 pm: Drop-in family art making workshops led by a teaching artist and the Queens Teens Institute for Art & Social Justice as part of Family Day.
2 pm: Walkthrough of Our first and last love with Harris.
2:30 pm: Walkthrough of Close to Home with Knight.
3 pm: Walkthrough of Buenos Vecinos with Schliebener Muñoz.
3:30 pm: Walkthrough of 9999 with Granger.
4 pm: Reception with food and drinks for purchase in the Unisphere Cafe by The August Tree.
Queens Museum is in the NYC Building in Flushing Meadows Corona Park. Two parking lots are nearby.
Images: Queens Museum