TOOT Vol. 3

Spaces of historical disputes…Gio: Brooklyn and Queens before they were assembled into boroughs.Jess: Washington Sq. park and a couple others were built on top of cemeteries.Derricka: Ellis Island and Liberty Island used to belong to NY but now it’s owned by NJ. Anna: ...

African Burial Ground, National Monument

Spaces of historical disputes…Jess: Greenwood Cemetery, a whole buncha war veterans are buried there. 5th ave and 9th street in BK – battle of bunker hill! A building in memory of the event. George Washington’s location in Washington heights.The WTC..

African Burial Ground, National Monument

Chia-En JaoLives and works in

Taipei, Taiwan

Taxi2016Color video with sound


Taipei, Taiwan


Adopting a documentary style, Taxi presents conversations between artist Chia-En Jao and Tapei taxi drivers while en route to historically contested places. These include destinations such as the Grand Hotel, the site of the highest ranking Shinto shrine during Japanese colonial rule.

Photo by xdgrace, deviantart.com


Taipei, Taiwan


Recorded from the back passenger seat, the discussions meander through memories of Taiwan’s decades-long martial law—which followed the Japanese occupation that ended in 1945—the Cold War, and present-day social-political topics. The different narratives that emerge challenge any predefined understanding of the city’s landmarks.


Taipei, Taiwan


Raian: I would ask to be taken to the best food spot in NYC. Khiri: I would hire him for a tour of NY, and the places that aren’t necessarily immediate attractions.In my neighborhood the first thing cab drivers try to do is identify if you’re from T&T or Guyana, and then if you know certain people from there, etc.Janel: I would ask him to take me to the HOOD. And talkin’. Alex: I’ve noticed that most taxi drivers are not from this country, and I would ask where they’re from and how they got here and if they like it here.KT: my mom tries to find out who they are. And ask all sorts of life story questions. Derricka: I have a lot of family members who are taxi drivers, usually I’m driving with them and it’s such a different thing than being in another cab.Dolfo: Mostly I’ve been in livery cabs. They’ll ask if I want to listen to music, and then they’ll ask me questions.


Taipei, Taiwan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5wJo28qBS0


Taipei, Taiwan



Taipei, Taiwan


Taipei, Taiwan

Arms no. 31 conveys the diverse histories of Taiwan. A flag in the tradition of coasts of arms, the work contains elements representing subsections of Taiwanese society, including aboriginal groups and religious communities. Nearby this massive patchwork banner is a vitrine that has paper handouts explaining the sources of the flags many fabrics and narratives behind select elements. By connecting history and storytelling, Jap created a collective insignia of Taiwan that honors individual memory and experience.

Arms no. 312016Textile patchwork

Sun XunLives and works in

Bejing

Mythological Time2016HD Animated Video with sound, powdered pigments on mulberry bark paper

Sun XunLives and works in

Bejing


SERIOUSLY. Watch this guy’s video.

Final prep for our visit!

Xiaoyu Weng studied Art History at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing and the CCA in San Francisco. She served as the founding director of the Kadist Art Foundation’s Asia Programs, Paris and San Francisco. There, she launched the Kadist Curatorial Collaboration, which organizes exhibitions that stimulate cultural exchange, and she also oversaw artist residencies and the building of the contemporary Asian art collection. Previously, she worked as program director of the Asian Contemporary Art Consortium in San Francisco and as a curator at the Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts at the California College of the Arts (CCA).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KabQ-dTNABg


Xiaoyu WengAssociate Curator of Chinese Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

“How can I break the rules of how art history is written? How an exhibition is made? How art is presented? I don’t think art is a purely aesthetic experience. It should engage with society; it should engage with people; it should engage with social, political, cultural issues. ”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KabQ-dTNABg


• Anna: I wanna see it. • Jess: Yeah, I’m excited, I love how there’s so many different

mediums to express their ideas.• Raian: The amount of money that people spend going to the

museum gauges the value of the experience. • Janel: I’m scared. I’ve been messed up by Doomocracy, and nothing

can compare to that. • KT: ALSO EXCITED! Kozak seems excited about this, even though he

can get carried away, but I’m still excited. • Chess: What tends to happen when people have open access to

museums, they go and it’s a major impact on them.


• Angel: Xiaoyu brought up the idea of artists using storytelling and narrative to show their work.

• Tash: I like how she doesn’t give prompts to the artists, just keywords…you can tell the general theme but there’s so many different directions.

• Camila: She also talks about how the audience should know where the artists come from and how that influences the work.

• .

What about our School? Our building?

Our neighborhood?What are the spaces that seem to crave artwork being placed

in them?

• The “Honeycombs” on the ceiling. They have potential for site specific work.

• KT: The giant cube in the front. The MLK cube. • Chess: the stairways, they’re so bleak.• Raian: The windows, there’s potential to show a HUGE picture on

them. Other buildings can’t do that. • Anna: the terrace(s) have potential for….ART!• Anna: Lincoln center has a lot of site specific art…it wouldn’t look

“good” in a different place. .

What about our School? Our building?

Our neighborhood?What are the spaces that seem to crave artwork being placed

in them? • Riddles: The metal framework…reminds me of a prison.• Cailan: The ceiling outside with all the colors. • Jess: The exterior terrace with those cubes of plants.• Michelle: the MLK Cube!! It’s so drab and dark…we wanna give it

some color. (Cor-Ten Steel) and the lunch room.• Anesia: The stairs leading up to the terrace. • Camila: the interior hallways. • Tash: The lobby….• Michelle: Boring classrooms….we gotta spruce it up.• Anesia: Our school has plants around the windows. • Jess: I love the windows. They’ open up the space and bring light in. .

I provided the artists with a set of keywords:TerritoryBorders

BoundariesDivide

Education

TOOT Vol. 3