Astraea Commissioned Print: Miriam Hernandez, Crouching Buddha: Soften, 11″ x 17″ paper with acrylic on synthetic cloth/wool thread
Brooklyn Museum of Art
Sackler Center for Feminist Art
200 Eastern Pkwy [map]
Saturday, October 25, 2 – 4:00pm
Free event: RSVP
Join us for an intergenerational panel discussion with Astraea awardees and printmakers discussing their art, the work of the Astraea Lesbian Visual Arts Committee, and what it means to be a Lesbian and Feminist artist in today’s art world. [RSVP]
Astraea’s Lesbian Visual Arts Committee promotes awareness of contemporary lesbian artists and their work in the lesbian community by organizing workshops, studio visits and additional educational activities. The committee also commissions renowned lesbian artists to create limited-edition prints which benefit Astraea’s work. The first three prints in the series were contributed by Deborah Kass, Joan Snyder and Miriam Hernández. [view commissioned prints]
Among artists who have received Astraea Visual Arts Awards are Maxine Fine, Chitra Ganesh, Simone Leigh, Dani Leventhal, and Alma Lopez. This year’s awardees are Jess Dunn, Elaine Gan, and amey gee. [see more awardees and their work]
Panelists:
Miriam Hernández has produced her biggest body of work in paintingthough her creative expression has encompassed many disciplines including sculpture, printmaking, photography and installation work. She embraces the tension and dialogue between figure and ground, between the self and the surrounding world, and between internal and external energy. Miriam’s work has been exhibited widely in solo and group exhibitions including at the MIXTA Gallery, the Nutshell Arts Center and the A.I.R. Gallery, and has been reviewed frequently in The New York Times. Her work is in the permanent collections of the Center for Puerto Rican Studies at Hunter College and El Museo del Barrio in New York. A former ALVA Committee member and Astraea Visual Arts Fund Panelist, Miriam is a contributing artist for Astraea’s Commissioned Print Series.
Simone Leigh creates sculptures of terracotta, gold and porcelain that examine the politics of the Black female body through layered histories of colonization and resistance. She has held residencies at Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s Workspace, the Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop, Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts, and Henry Street Settlement. Simone’s work has been exhibited nationally at venues including Rush Arts Gallery Project Space, Exit Art, Momenta Art Gallery and the Chicago Cultural Center. Her work has been reviewed widely, including in The New York Times, The New Yorker, Trace Magazine, NY1 News, The New York Blade and Flavorpill. She is a recipient of the 2007 Astraea Visual Arts Award.
Dani Leventhal is a drawer, sculptor and video artist who investigates socio-political material ranging from homosexual identity and class, to immigration and racism, through a variety of mediums of sculpture and installation. Dani has had exhibitions and screenings both nationally and internationally. In 2007 she received an Astraea Visual Arts Award and a Women’s Studio Workshop Book Arts Grant. Her video Draft 9 received the Directors Choice Award at the International Festival of Documentary Films in Jihlava, Czech Republic in 2005. She earned her MFA at the University of Illinois, Chicago. Born in Columbus, Ohio, Dani lives and works in Rosendale, New York.
Moderator:
Flavia Rando is an art historian who teaches Women’s and Sexualities Studies at Brooklyn College, City University of New York. A longtime Lesbian (art) activist, Flavia is a founding member of the Astraea Lesbian Visual Arts Committee. She has lectured and published widely on contemporary art and queer, feminist, and ethnic identifications. Flavia is currently curating and writing the catalogue essay for a retrospective exhibition of works by Maxine Fine, a 2003 Astraea Visual Arts Awardee.
