Puzzles With Purpose – Metropolitan Magazine
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Valentine’s Day and the Chinese New Year are serving as Connolly’s curatorial springboard for her AXP selections and she’s eager to highlight the work of more Asian artists. Christopher Eamon and Alaina Simone, AXP’s first two guest curators, similarly took their time selecting artists, searching for works that were vibrant and appeal to puzzlers and art lovers of all ages. All the curators have been intentional in their choosing, even considering the artists’ practice and how it relates to puzzling. They took their time selecting artists, searching for works that were vibrant, by artists of a range of ages, that would make for a puzzling time.
Curator Alaina Simone also reached out to Helina Metaferia, an artist and professor at Brown University whose process of collaging is different, yet similarly embodies the joyful mechanics of puzzles. Metaferia’s piece is titled ‘Headdress 6’, part of her ‘By Way of Revolution Series’ that she started in 2018. Typically, Metaferia’s artistic practice uses different research materials such as contemporary photographs, she puts them together in a way that’s like “an unfolding of a new story or a new history.” For artwork titled Headdress 6, Metaferia photographed a former student, who became the central image. The artist went through archives of the Black Liberation movements and collaged images taken from multiple historic protests. The result is powerful. She enjoys the fact that her art is accessible, that anyone can experience it.
Sometimes, she said, the art world can feel like a mystery. “It’s really timely actually for all the things that we’ve experienced in 2020,” Metaferia said. “It’s really appropriate to have this in the hands of everyday folk who want to remember this time period, remember where we are and where we continue to be when it comes to issues of social justice.” “In this time when galleries and institutions are having to make different changes according to social distancing — and a lot of times that includes closure — [AXP is] giving people an opportunity to experience art at home, to think about culture, to think about the role of the image and the art in social movements,” she said. “I do think this is an appropriate project for everyone and hopefully people can find time, now that we have ample time to enjoy a puzzle.
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