For the 2020 Myers Art Prize, the Art and Art education program invited students to explore how art contributes to unsilencing identitites that have historically been suppressed. The ten award winning works engage with a range of timely issues that affect the world and touch individual's lives. Meet the artists below:
The selected works are currently on view at Macy Art Gallery from January 20 — February 6, 2020.
Carianna Arredondo
Venus, Video
Having grown up in an environment full of dualities — living in a both loving, yet violent household, negotiating her cultural heritage and mixed ancestry as a Chicana, Tejana, and, child of Eastern European descent, and navigating the world as a bisexual woman— Carianna's work often illustrates the complexity of identity. As a visual artist, her exploration of "specific materials, gestures, and rituals that wrestle with memory, trauma, spirituality, and place, my work serves as a testimony, that, without darkness, we do not see the light."
My work serves as a testimony, that, without darkness, we do not see the light
Kristina Bivona
Women and Text, Color Zine
Bivona's work confronts a society that has no problem objectifying women but criminalizes women who profit from their objectification. Her artistic practice examines thes power dynamics "from the perspective of the white female body which knows a woman can exist simultaneously complicit and resistant to acts of violence". Bivona has worked with her hands since childhood and has applied her body in a variety of ways. These ways are not limited to experience in pro domme-work, academia, riding freight, squatting, mothering, politics, and art. Through language, text, and materials she manipulates issues of sex-work, feminism, modernism, activism, and the aesthetics of counterculture. Her art is a form of resistance exposed by the navigation of harmful social norms.
Often we try to validate artworks with scholarship and publishing, but these works, these artists, these women of color, and queerness, and culturally responsive practices, that can stand on their own and educate as works of art.
Jesl Xena Rae Cruz
Trial and Opportunity, Mixed Media
When asked to introduce herself, Jesl says, "I think about core values that you and I might have in common, such as a deep love for the arts and the intrinsic motivation to keep the arts alive in all aspects of living and learning". Jesl is an educator of students with autism spectrum disorders, a children’s book author, an arts integration advocate, a book and paper arts enthusiast, and the list goes on... and on...and on... Jesl's experience as an artist is one of continuous evolution, "I believe that I am an artist— continuously evolving, creating, discovering, envisioning, becoming and... unsilencing."
I have chosen to create my art piece by integrating book and paper arts and poetry-writing. Throughout the process, I found myself engaging in introspection by looking back at the past, looking forward into the future, and being aware of, and embracing the current situation, of what my students can do, and be empowered to do through the arts.
Sungah Jun
Fragmented Whole, Mixed Media
Jun's work evolves from simple initial curiosity. What drives the artist's work? Questions emanating "from everyday incidents. Big questions branch out into smaller and deeper questions". By creating artworks, Jun discovers and learn about herself and surroundings. Her work carries various forms of art such as p"hotography, film/video, painting, installation, sculpture, and digital arts. I believe that experimenting the unlimited potential is an enrichment.
It would be ridiculous to claim that any language, emotion, reason, judgement, cognition or moral conduct can fully explain humanity.
Autumn Lin Kietpongler
I had a dream that you were born beneath a starry sky, digital embroidery
AUTUMNLIN is known for her one-of-a-kind zipper pieces that have been seen in television, theatre, music videos, and advertisements for clients such as Cher, Kylie Minogue, Steve Aoki, MAC, and YKK. She was one of the top 3 finalists on Bravo's Styled to Rock, hand-picked by Rihanna to be mentored by celebrity stylist, Mel Ottenberg. Winner of the RAW ARTIST Fashion Designer of the Year and a Designer-in-Residence in the Philadelphia Fashion Incubator in 2012, AUTUMNLIN has had the honor of showing her work at New York Fashion Week, Philadelphia Fashion Week, RAW Hollywood, MIT, and the SFMOMA runway. Press tears include Harper's Bazaar Vietnam, British Vogue, and ZINK.
When I work in narrative, I speak in symbols, in fabric, in color. The story which I cannot say, the story which I wish to speak into existence, and the story I am compelled to tell no matter what.
Hyunsoo Kim
Voices of the Unheard, Textile
Hyunsoo Kim is a multidisciplinary artist who has a background in Textiles & Fashion as an artist, designer, merchandiser, entrepreneur, researcher and educator. Her research trajectory lies in technology, convergence, craftsmanship, sustainability, and its social impact. She is currently a EdDCT candidate and a studio fellow at a hybrid makerspace, ThingSpace, at Teachers College, Columbia University. She holds a BFA in Textiles from Rhode Island School of Design and an MS in Textile Design from Philadelphia University.
This ongoing 'Sustainable Leather' research reveals critical issues of environmental pollution, animal rights and human welfare behind the leather tannery production.
Grace Ludmer
Rattled Series, Porcelain
Grace Ludmer is an artist and educator. She graduated from the University of Michigan Stamps School of Art and Design with a BFA in illustration and community art. After graduating, Grace served as an AmeriCorps State and VISTA member, teaching and developing art curriculum in schools in Providence, RI. She currently works as a graphic designer and illustrator. Grace is obtaining her masters in Art Education with a teaching certification from Teachers College Department of Art and Art Education. She believes in the power of storytelling and recognizes visual art as critical method of doing so.
I created this collection of porcelain rattles as a way to give my (and maybe your) sadness a playful way to be seen and heard.
Ashley Mask
Labor, Pencil Shavings
Ashley Mask addresses the everyday in her artwork, using photography, painting, and time-based media to explore the communal relationships connecting people, places, and things. Her work has appeared in numerous solo and group exhibitions, including the Delaware Center for the Contemporary Arts Biennial, “Empathy Plus One” at the Colourworks Gallery in Wilmington, Delaware, New Talent show at Space Gallery in Denver, Colorado, and “Cups of Waves” at Naropa University and University of Colorado Andrew J. Macky Gallery. She is currently a Doctoral Candidate in the Art and Art Education program at Columbia University Teachers College in New York City, which means her creative art practice is primarily manifested in the form of research: writing and reading and writing some more.
Consider all of the objects we come into contact everyday, as monuments to the unseen, unheard, and unknown labor that made them.
Eric Mason
It's Not Me It's You, The Power of a Word, Video Diptique
When Eric Mason picked up a camera for the first time in sixth grade, he sparked a passion. Al- though his fascination with photography was new, his creative edge was not. He has always had a knack for making things. In the vein of his favorite photographer, Thomas Struth, Mason prefers ur- ban landscapes over human subjects. He enjoys finding the beauty in seemingly mundane objects. Mason has come a long way from using a Canon AV-1 35mm to snap photos in elementary school. During his undergraduate study he continued the exploration of the camera. He pursued motion picture filmmaking and further developed a passion for the captured image, combining videography, photography and film editing. Eric has since earned a Master of Fine Arts degree in photogra- phy and a Master of Arts in printmaking. He served for several years as an art school administrator before enrolling at Columbia Teacher’s College where he is now an art education doctoral student and photography instructor.
I make work based on what I see, what I deal with, I'm exposed to, what I respond to
Carina Maye
I Know You 32 Series 1-3, Digital print
A Georgia native, Carina D. Maye, is a graduate of the Unsinkable Albany State University in Albany, Georgia, where she received her Bachelor of Arts degree. She received her Master of Fine Art in Sculpture in 2013 and her Master of Art in Business Design Arts Leadership in 2018 both from Savannah College of Art and Design in Atlanta, GA. Carina is currently pursuing an Ed.D in the Art and Art Education program at Teacher’s College, Columbia University in New York, New York. She currently serves as the Macy Gallery Fellow and Coordinator at Teachers College, Columbia University.
It is crucial for me and my work to move away from solely commenting on my perspective of the disenfranchised voice and instead allow my subject to speak for themselves.