The images presented are taken from a body of work entitled “HOLDUP in the HOOD”. They document an after-school, collaborative arts curriculum rooted in self-portraiture. I co- authored and teach the collaborative to inner city children in the Manchester section of Pittsburgh, PA. The program and subsequent documentation have run successively for 11 years.
The focus of my work is on portraiture, both individually and as a collective body of work. My subjects and the subject matter incorporate drawings, re-cycled photographs and print media as well as body gesture to explore issues of race,class and gender.
“HOLDUP in the HOOD” is both a communal and personal exploration of self. It concerns the identity of self that comes with the realization of making one’s mark. The work is about social interaction and the collective image of youth learning to assert their own representation. The ongoing development of that representation allows each student to project their image beyond the re-segregated, under-resourced public school classrooms and out into the world.
I am aware of and resonate with a larger artistic context that “HOLDUP in the HOOD” fits into as it documents art-making as both a process of empowerment and investigation. Artists such as Wendy Ewald and Tim Rollins & K.O.S. come to mind in exploring similar artistic terrain.
