Response to Tumelo Mosaka talk

“Location, location, location.” I liked that he said that when let loose how bewildered he felt in the midwest.

I should’ve written this when the lecture was more fresh in my mind, but here goes my best reflection. The things that I came away with from Musaka’s lecture:

He wasn’t the greatest storyteller, but such things can befall people who have to speak in a second language and I didn’t mind. And, for one thing, I think it’s pretty fishy to go to school just for curating. That just seems odd to me.

I admired that he admitted he is young and doesn’t yet know everything about art and curating, something that not every curator I’ve heard speak has believed. I like the way that he doesn’t make art himself necessarily, but actually he does by curating. The way that he finds artists, and who he finds, then how he assembles them is different from how any other curator would. Isn’t that art? The assemblage of expression? The collage of other human ideas?

I really need to go over and look at those videos. I wish he would’ve talked about the show more, but I guess it was interesting to hear about his process and a little history leading up to now.

I did get some ideas while he was talking about bringing art to the people and curating. I thought of a few projects I’d like to start either on the breaks or after I’ve graduated and gone back home. When I’m home, I am constantly eager to share what I learn at KCAI with others and how art, and having dialogues about it, can really bring a community together. I think I might try and take over a run down building downtown where I live and try to start some sort of community gallery or one night showing. I wonder if I could make some publicized assignment to the community, and to invite anyone to take a photo and submit it. Maybe the photo would be in the parameters of a word like “home”. Anyway, I’m kind of excited to get back to my community. But after reading a lot of articles written by Russian cubo-futurists it really is a stick situation to try and “bring art to the people” because any way you go at it, you could be labeling people as less than capable. Or worse, elevating yourself because you are the “cultured one”.