You’re Invited: A New York Art Show At Below Grand

Photos of art courtesy of Nakai Falcón.

‘The portrait functions as an avenue for viewers to peer into lives outside of their own,’ says curator Nakai Falcón of his latest group exhibition Love How Your Windows Glisten.

Featuring artists Julian Adon Alexander, Anthony Coleman, Choichun Leung, and Hakeem Olayinka the exhibition at New York’s artist-run space Below Grand Gallery is a showcase of both young and seasoned artists who've operated on the periphery of the mainstream. Across painting and drawing, all four artists explore the functionality of the portrait when it comes to connectivity through their own particular lenses. Nakai himself is a curator who primarily focuses on collaborations with creatives in POC and queer communities, with shows at Below Grand, 81 Leonard Gallery, ed. varie, :iidrr, and the Whitney Museum of American Art to name a few. Here’s our recent chat with him ahead of the opening this Friday, January 18th from 5pm.

Anthony Coleman

My first question is, what is the vibe in the New York art scene right now?

Nakai Falcón: As of right now, I'd have to say that it kind of depends where you are geographically in New York. I think over the last maybe six to eight years, there has been a resurgence of DIY spaces. A lot of folks were augmenting their living spaces to be like small art galleries or alternative spaces so the alternative space scene has really been booming over that time. But in terms of style here in the city, a lot of the work that I tend to gravitate towards tends to be in downtown Manhattan. It's usually the same things that you would imagine are echoing. A lot of embracing of otherness in alternative cultures. For me, coming into the art scene later and also as an appreciator not a maker I guess I was stuck on how I could be apart of it. Community was a big emphasis on what I was interested in. And I think all of that ended up pouring into my own creative practice, which is really dealing with otherness, memory, and kind of creating communities out of all those other folks that don't necessarily want to be pigeonholed into a certain bracket.

Circling back to how the scene is, I think, in Manhattan right now, you always have the historic sections, whether it be something like Chelsea or over in Uptown. Then you have the Upper East Side where it’s all really commercialised. But Downtown, I would say there’s more circulation around emerging spaces and artists. A lot of places have always been home to emerging creatives, but at the same time, some older creatives that never got their shine are beginning to kind of pop up. An example being Alain Levitt as a photographer. He has been taking photos since way back in the 90s and early 2000s, but for a lot of folks, he wasn't a household name in comparison to someone like maybe Ryan McGinley. And the irony is that they all hung out in the same space. But now you’re seeing folks like him, like Al Diaz, who are getting recognised within the cannon, alongside a lot of those familiar names like Kenny Scharf. Emergent alternative cultures are getting a little bit more shine and representation. Plus seeing how those people that have always been following along have become more prominent voices that people listen to now.

Choichun Leung

That's a really interesting point and something that I haven’t actually thought about until you’ve mentioned it right now, on how people are starting to appreciate the people and artists who have always been there but maybe just didn’t get their moment at the time. 

Yeah I mean all those alternative cultures have always taken place but from my perspective now, I think maybe it’s coming up in a more vocal way. Almost like the alternative is becoming mainstream. 

Can you tell me about what it is like for a person of colour or queer artist in New York right now? 

I think when you belong to a marginalized community, the instinct is to deal with representation. That's always kind of at the forefront, even on a subconscious level. But for my practice, I tend to gravitate towards artists that aren't looking to go through the usual route that a lot of us are bottlenecked into where we have this history. Like here’s us overcoming the upheaval and dealing with struggle and the trauma. That's still a very prevalent thing right now, of course, especially when we're in a very inflammatory time where it feels like there isn’t any neutral spaces to exist. You usually have to go hard left or hard right. But I gravitate towards those that want to kind of steer away from the usual formula that we're given. And so for something like Love How Your Windows Glisten, the irony is that I wanted to focus on something that tends to be usually pretty dry. With portraiture. It's very simple in terms of dealing with the figure. And often times it's just like mimicking what is being in front of you, the sitter. But with this group, I wanted it to be a blend of both formally trained artists and self-taught. A portrait that is supposed to tell you something about the person being depicted. 

Is there a connection between the four featured artists in this exhibition? 

No. I attended undergrad with Hakeem Olayinka then everyone else I had come across just from literally social media and visiting other art spaces. Anthony Coleman was interesting because I had learned about his work through a book that had gotten published maybe two years ago and it was called I Like Drawing. I'd say a little bit of a background dealing with self-taught and outsider artwork just from interning with other galleries specialised in it and  I think I always gravitated towards that too. Oftentimes with self-taught artists, they are usually underresourced. And for something like Anthony Coleman, I didn't know this going in, but I didn't know that his social media where all that work I had seen was managed by his assistant. Anthony is someone who lives in assisted living, is non-verbal and communicates through sign language, writing and drawing. So when I reached out and I was like, ‘Oh my god, huge fan. this work is amazing,’ and his assistant who is also an artist was the one replying. Although the other artists in the show don’t have a relationship to each other, when I pitched it to each of them that I wanted to do a group show the reaction was really cool because you don’t usually get to see that interweaving of self-taught and formally trained. Especially the younger artists. 

Julian Adon Alexander

What is the story behind the title Love How Your Windows Glisten? 

Love How Your Windows Glisten is an idea that really comes from that play from the eyes being windows to the soul. This is an exhibition which focuses on portraiture, where I have more of a history curating photography. There are fundamentals tied to what the portrait does. And one of the biggest things is playing with that idea of the face, the profile, and the eyes. And in a lot of these works, the eyes aren't necessarily the focus, but in terms of reading the body and the face, that is at the forefront. And so, yeah, the title really comes off of just like that phrase of, and it's such a corny thing, too, of talking about the eyes being  the windows to the soul.

How do you think that art helps the world?

I actually was just talking about this with a colleague of mine and I asked do you think art actually changes things? I don't think that it directly changes things but I do think it's vital in terms of being the catalyst for folks that can do change. For example the art syndicate IRAK NYC with Kunle Martins from the 90s, where there was this group of artists hanging out and expressing themselves catalyzes the next generation to think differently. Things to learn that can sometimes be carried over for better or for worse. I think art has that function. 

Hakeem Olayinka