DC Loft Gallery

        I have never been to an art gallery like the DC loft Gallery. I felt like it was a nice experience I really loved the art work. The thing about this gallery that stood out to me was that the art work was not limited to one type. What I mean by this is that not only did they have different types of painting they had free standing art work, such as the piece located in the back room of the gallery that was a chair covered in different kinds of ties. Also I noticed the art piece that was composed of different pictures of the same dollar bill. I like how that whole piece was made up of individual pieces of art work. I really found the curator Brian J. Jegan very interesting. I don’t know why but when I think of an artist that has been working for a while I feel like there work would some how stick to the same theme. When I looked at the paintings done by Brian J. Legan I saw a variety of different looks. For example two pieces that I thought differed were 

Two pieces of art work that I critiqued were Sapphire Pebbles in a Jade Flow and 22” Circles. What drew me to the 22” circles by Richard Siegman was the shape and texture of this piece.  This piece was made of acrylic resin board and composed of 3 circles. I like how the artists used the paint to create texture and movement in all three art panels. The artist used only primary colors but I like how you can see how his brush strokes on the canvas overlap to create new colors. For example you can see a big paint stroke going up threw the middle of one of the panels and you can see it overlapping another stroke the artists made. The intersection of the two colors combines to make a new color. The other piece of artwork I critiqued was a painting by Brian J. Legan called Sapphire Pebbles in a Jade Flow. I was really drawn to this painting because it had a lot of green in it which I like. Not only that I just like the mix of all the colors. In the painting I saw blues, purples, yellow, and green. This painting had a very spacey look to it. If you look close to the painting you also see this texture that adds rhythm to it. The painting incorporated geometric and organic shapes into it. 

An Evening with Nikki Giovanni

The event (An Evening with Nikki Giovanni) was very insightful. I really enjoyed listing to Mrs. Giovanni as she reflected on the past and spoke about her views and opinions of our world today. I found her to be very funny, relatable and down to earth. When she first started speaking that night she spoke about where we are at today and she commented on the fact that really the only black woman that go notable recognition after she died was Lena Horn. She said there are many black women that have achieved so much in there lifetime that also deserved recognition. This lead her to talk to the audience about her family and a woman she knew and she read a poem out of her book called 100 Best African American Poems called The Aunt (by: Mary Agnus). She stated that the hip-hop generation is taking over and how now days you can find Hip hop almost everywhere you look. Nikki Giovanni even said that one of her favorite rappers was Tupac and how he was such a poet. Another topic she touched on was the fact that we need to get back control of our bodies and mind and how now days there are way to many black men being locked up and all of their rights are being taken from them and she compared them to slaves. She spoke on the fact that one of your most important rights is to vote and how we are responsible for putting these people in office. Mrs. Giovanni said that she loves to watch TV and it was funny when she ran threw some TV history and stated shows she considered stupid. This all lead to a statement she made about how accidental learning is very important. This basically meant that a lot of things you know and make you who you are were not necessarily things you were intentionally trying to learn. She said you can learn things you never thought you would learn by just noticing you surroundings and taking in new things from everyday life. It was interesting when she told us that she knew Rosa Parks and she told us that she was a funny beautiful woman and how her actions were a result of destiny. She also spoke on Emmett Till and how as a result of events surrounding what happened to him it sparked a chain of change. Finally Nikki Giovanni closed on how she believed Facebook was a political network instead of a social network. Then the evening closed with some questions from the audience.