Notes for Alton Sterling

July 11, 2016 by Mariamma Kambon

Intro A video of the cold, violent execution of a prone Black man by white police officers opened my very first day in Louisiana. In transit I may have imagined the famed streets of New Orleans – the fertile land that has nourished Jazz and Rhythm-and-Blues; superb cuisine that just might be reminiscent of my own well-seasoned Caribbean fare; and a renowned debauchery that marks the place as vibrant and outrageous. Alton Sterling’s murder at the hands of NOPD served […]

Categories: Activism, Uncategorized • Tags: African American, African Diaspora, Alton Sterling, Baton Rouge, community, execution, family, freedom, grief, Jo Hines, John C. Mutter, justice, Louisiana, Mariamma Kambon, Michael Eric Dyson, mural, murder, photography, Police brutality, protest, race-based oppression, racism, resistance, Trinidad and Tobago, Triple S Convenience Store

Blood at the Root: Activism in Art

May 30, 2016 by Mariamma Kambon

Nooses were hanging like vines. Roots penetrated deeply into blood soaked soil. And then there was a fight.   Blood at the Root is a small-scale production. The cast numbers six. It was performed at the National Black Theatre, which has a seating capacity of less than two hundred. The set is comprised of a flat backdrop and six chairs in constant rotation. But there is nothing small-scale about the impact of this play. Blood at the Root forces the […]

Categories: Performance, Uncategorized • Tags: Allison Jaye, awareness, Black Lives Matter, Blood at the Root, Brandon Carter, change, Christian Thompson, Civil rights, division, Dominique Morisseau, empathy, Eric Garner, Hi-Arts, hip hop dance, installation, Jena 6, Kenzie Ross, labels, Louisiana, lynching, Mariamma Kambon, mass incarceration, National Black Theatre, New York, Nooses, Penn State Centre Stage, photography, play, prejudice, production, protest, racism, resistance, rules, Sade Lythcott, stage set, Steven Broadnax, Stori Ayers, strange fruit, tolerance, Trayvon Martin, Tyler Reilly

Our Music Continues: Michael Kelly Williams

May 10, 2016 by Mariamma Kambon

  Liturgy for Lenox Lounge Gentrification is a sticky subject for many African-Americans. I once heard it summed up as such: “White people? You don’t come to join us. You come to displace us.” African-Americans became a part of the originally Dutch neighborhood of Harlem in 1905. A murder within a house on West 133rd Street turned it into a challenging property to rent. The solution decided upon by the owner was to turn to a Black realtor, who rented […]

Categories: Personalities, Sculpture, Uncategorized • Tags: art, brooklyn, Daughters of the Dust, Detroit, gentrification, Harlem, Harlem Renaissance, iconic, jazz, Lenox Lounge, Liturgy for Lenox Lounge, malcolm x blvd, Mariamma Kambon, Michael Kelly Williams, music, New York, nkisi, photography, resistance, sculptor, Sculpture, Serett Metal Works, surrealism, visual arts

The Sacred Collaboration: Paintings by Sophia Dawson

May 2, 2016 by Mariamma Kambon

“I gesso the material black, whether its canvas or wood, I gesso it all black to prepare the surface. It’s a conscious political act for me to work on a black surface … All black. All black everything.” Part I “My greatest inspiration is without a doubt the Almighty God. He is the one who gifted me my talent and I consider myself a co-creator with Him. All the ideas I have are the ones that come from Him. All […]

Categories: Exhibition, Personalities, Uncategorized • Tags: all black everything, black gesso, Black Panther Party, Black Power, Civil rights, Dequi Sadiki, Emory Douglas, Erykah Badu, faith, fine art, freedom, freedom fighter, human rights, I Am Free, Kanye West, Lauryn Hill, Leon Bridges, luz de tu sonrisa, luzdetusonrisa, Mariamma Kambon, mass incarceration, Mondo We Langa, motherhood, New York, Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art, painter, PEMDAS, Pharaoh, photography, political prisoners, portraits, Portraiture, prison abolition, resistance, Sam Cooke, Snug Harbor, Sophia Dawson, Staten Island, vision, visual artist, visual arts

The Son of the Prophet Journeys to the Land of the Believers

April 22, 2016 by Mariamma Kambon

The earliest image of my family was captured with Marcus Garvey’s portrait occupying the position typically reserved for White Jesus in the West Indian home.   “Children, children! Children, children! Humble yourself and be calm, one day somehow You’ll remember him, you will No one remember old Marcus Garvey No one remember old Marcus Garvey Garvey’s old, yet young Garvey’s old, yet young” – Old Marcus Garvey, Burning Spear   “My trod was in the livity and order. I honored […]

Categories: Personalities, Uncategorized • Tags: African Diaspora, African Liberation, black god, Black Power, Bob Marley, breadfruit trees, Burning Spear, caribbean, Clyde Noel, colonialism, dreadlocks, Ethiopia, family, family portrait, flags, food independence, Haile Selassie, Harris Promenade, In the Lion's Den, Jamaica, Julius Garvey, Junior Bisnath, luz de tu sonrisa, luzdetusonrisa, Marcus Garvey, Marcus Mosiah Garvey, Mariamma Kambon, New York, photography, postcolonial, prophet, Ras Daniel, rasta, Rastafari, Rastafarian, red black and green, resistance, San Fernando, Steel Pulse, Trini Levi, Trinidad and Tobago, twelve tribes, Twelve Tribes of Israel, white jesus, Worth his weight in gold

David Hammons/ Obeah Man

March 23, 2016 by Mariamma Kambon

The art of David Hammons usually beckons to me from wherever it is perched within a group show. How can someone who uses such a myriad of methods and media have a voice so distinct amid the ambitious cacophony of contemporary art? It is the obeah in the thing – the spirit of the miraculous and the rebellious. It is the profundity revealed in the quotidian that allows his voice to rise above the rest. Obeah is black magic some […]

Categories: Exhibition, Uncategorized • Tags: african amerian, African American, african art, artist, bird, black magic, boukman, champ, David Hammons, dreadlocks, Exhibition, fine art, five decades, fur coat, Harlem, human hair, installation, Kongo, mal yeux, malcolm x blvd, maljo, Mariamma Kambon, mass incarceration, mau mau, mnuchin gallery, New York, nkisi, Obeah, obeah man, okomfo anokye, orange is the new black, photography, power figure, rebellion, resistance, slavery, snowball, standing room only, tribal art, Trinidad and Tobago, visual arts

Chiharu Shiota – Keys in Venice and New York

March 5, 2016 by Mariamma Kambon

Encountering Chiharu Shiota’s work at the Venice Biennale 2015 was indeed like stumbling upon a familiar tongue in a foreign land. Yet the lingua had been extrapolated into such sublime poetry that it was rendered almost completely new to me. In late 2013 I became aware of mass incarceration, a system of control and suppression unique to the United States, not only in its stupendous volume but in its targeting of the historically disenfranchised and underprivileged segments of the society. […]

Categories: Uncategorized • Tags: A Key in the Hand, artist, Biennale 2015, caribbean, Chiharu Shiota, Exhibition, fine art, installation, italy, Japan, Japan Pavilion, Japanese artist, keys, loss, Mariamma Kambon, mass incarceration, memories, memory, New York, photography, Piers 42/44, red yarn, resistance, State of Being, The Armory, The Armory Show 2016, Trinidad and Tobago, venice, Venice Biennale, Venizia, wooden boat

Completing the Circle of Diaspora

March 3, 2016 by Mariamma Kambon

In a desire to gain knowledge of the part of myself that existed prior to colonialism and that survived in spite of it, I have spent years purposefully examining the identifiable markers of Africa within Trinbagonian culture. Dr. Robert Farris Thompson’s work was bound to enter my intellectual repartee sooner or later. His preeminent scholarly work, Flash of the Spirit, had unlocked the meaning in familiar symbols and rituals for me. Thompson describes the “sacred art of the Yoruba in […]

Categories: Uncategorized • Tags: African Diaspora, african drums, african retention, alex lasalle, amma mcken, Baba Neil Clarke, C. Daniel Dawson, caribbean, CCCADI, city college, cuba, Elizabeth Yeampierre, flash of the spirit, Harlem, Iyesa Drum ensemble, karla moore, Lumumba bandele, Mariamma Kambon, marta moreno vega, New York, ogun, orisha, photography, resistance, robert farris thompson, roman diaz, Sheriden booker, something positive, Trinidad and Tobago

“Omen” featured in group show, EXPLICIT PROTOCOL

November 27, 2013 by Mariamma Kambon

The piece, “Omen/ He Dances in the Courtyard of the Impertinent” was on display in Tjaden Gallery, Ithaca, NY from October 21 to November 1, 2013, in the group show “Explicit Protocol” Decades ago, “justice” was already an ambiguous term when applied to the carceral system of the United States, with its overt and inherent biases of class and particularly of race. In 1967, in a letter to his father, from solitary confinement, George Jackson had a clear concept of […]

Categories: Uncategorized • Tags: abolition, Anarchist Black Cross, Angela Davis, Betye Saar, cornell university, Exhibition, explicit protocol, George Jackson, he dances in the courtyard of the impertinent, history, installation, James Baldwin, Jericho Movement, liberation theology, Mariamma Kambon, mass incarceration, Mecke Nagel, omen, Paget Henry, politicized cosmologies, politicized theology, prison, prison abolition, prison industrial complex, rebellion, resistance, shango, slavery