Sundown (Number Twenty)

2019 - Photography (Photography)

152.4 x 114.3 cm

Xaviera Simmons

location: Brooklyn, New York
year born: 1974
gender: female
nationality: American
home town: New York, New York

Xaviera Simmons often employs her own body and collected materials in the service of her photographs and performances. Not to be mistaken as mere portraiture, however, Simmons’ works are explorations of the Black body in relation to landscape and other dimensions of non-linear space and time. Concealing and flattening her subjects with costumes and collage-like, abstract pictorial devices, the artist arranges archival photographs, printed textiles, and anthropological artifacts in configurations that highlight the power of visual culture to shape contemporary understandings of the self. Dressed in wax-printed broadcloth, the subject of Sundown (Number Twenty) holds a photograph from the Jim Crow era in her left hand and an African mask in her right. The busy backdrop of tropical flora reinforces problematic associations of fantasy and exoticism suggested by the masked figure. Simultaneously concealing and replacing her own image, Simmons allows her individual identity to dissolve into the cultural constructs and histories that each artefact and image holds.


Artist Xaviera Simmons’s diverse body of work is committed to multiplicity. Eschewing linear notions of history, her approach to investigating themes such as the shifting notions surrounding landscape and the conditions of African American female experience are cyclical in nature. Her studio practice demonstrates a fidelity to no single artistic modality or creative process; rather, Simmons’ interdisciplinary pursuits are in constant, active flux. Encompassing installation, photography, performance, and sound and video works, her evolving approach to artmaking is emblematic of the plurality of cultural experience and the myriad ways in which identity is constructed in contemporary culture.


Colors:



Karachi Series 1 (Chandra Acarya, 7:50pm, 30 August 2008, Ramadan, Karachi)
© » KADIST

Bani Abidi

2008

The threshold in contemporary Pakistan between the security of private life and the increasingly violent and unpredictable public sphere is represented in Abidi’s 2009 series Karachi ...

Death at a 30 Degree Angle
© » KADIST

Bani Abidi

2012

The perceived effortlessness of power, projecting above experiences of labored subordination is examined in Death at a 30 Degree Angle by Bani Abidi, which funnels this projection of image through the studio of Ram Sutar, renowned in India for his monumental statues of political figures, generally from the post-independence generation...

Empire's Borders II-Passage
© » KADIST

Chen Chieh-Jen

2010

Empire’s Borders II – Passage and Empire’s Borders II – Workers are from the three-channel film installation Empire’s Borders II – Western Enterprise, Inc...

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Karachi Series 1 (Chandra Acarya, 7:50pm, 30 August 2008, Ramadan, Karachi)
© » KADIST

Bani Abidi

2008

The threshold in contemporary Pakistan between the security of private life and the increasingly violent and unpredictable public sphere is represented in Abidi’s 2009 series Karachi ...

Death at a 30 Degree Angle
© » KADIST

Bani Abidi

2012

The perceived effortlessness of power, projecting above experiences of labored subordination is examined in Death at a 30 Degree Angle by Bani Abidi, which funnels this projection of image through the studio of Ram Sutar, renowned in India for his monumental statues of political figures, generally from the post-independence generation...

Untitled (Joseph T. Robinson Standing at a Podium in a Room), Damaged series
© » KADIST

Lisa Oppenheim

2003

The Damaged series by Lisa Oppenheim takes a series of selected photographs from the Chicago Daily News (1902 – 1933) as its source material...

The Illusion of Everything
© » KADIST

Daniel Crooks

2014

The Illusion of Everything (2014) follows an unseen pedestrian as he navigates the Australian city of Melbourne’s dense and intricate network of laneways...

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Mansudae Master Class
© » KADIST

Che Onejoon

2013

For the last few years, Che Onejoon has been focusing on the relationships between African countries and North Korea...

Daniel Clowes interviewed by Rene de Guzman
© » KADIST

Daniel Clowes is a graphic novelist, screenwriter, and Bay Area treasure...

Neglected middle class may be key to growing stagnant art market
© » THEARTNEWSPER

Neglected middle class may be key to growing stagnant art market Art market Museums & heritage Exhibitions Books Podcasts Columns Technology Adventures with Van Gogh Search Search Art market analysis Neglected middle class may be key to growing stagnant art market The spotlight tends to fall on big spenders, but what of “professional class” buyers, who often feel intimidated by the art world? Scott Reyburn 11 December 2023 Share Injecting new life: initiatives such as Avant Arte and Artist Support Pledge that attract less well-off collectors could revive a flat market Photo: splitov27 Art Basel and UBS recently issued their latest annual Survey of Global Collecting , which analyses the habits and attitudes of more than 2,800 high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) across the world...

Penguins host 2 children through Make-A-Wish Foundation
© » TRIBLIVE

Penguins host 2 children through Make-A-Wish Foundation | TribLIVE.com Penguins/NHL Penguins host 2 children through Make-A-Wish Foundation Triblive Monday, Feb...

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20
© » KADIST

Chris Wiley

2012

Architectural details become abstracted renderings in Chris Wiley’s inkjet prints 11 and 20 (both 2012)...

Nothing New
© » KADIST

Oded Hirsch

2012

Oded Hirsch’s video work Nothing New (2012) utilizes seemingly absurdist tropes to raise more trenchant questions about communal action and collective identity in modern day Israel...

South Africa Righteous Space
© » KADIST

Hank Willis Thomas

2014

South Africa Righteous Space by Hank Willis Thomas is concerned with history and identity, with the way race and ‘blackness’ has not only been informed but deliberately shaped and constructed by various forces – first through colonialism and slavery, and more recently through mass media and advertising – and reminds us of the financial and economic stakes that have always been involved in representations of race....

La Ligne du Temps
© » KADIST

Valeska Soares

2012

Relying on repetition and repurposed materials, Soares works to interrogate time—its measurement, its passing, and its meaning...

Related artist(s) to: Xaviera Simmons » Sara Vanderbeek, » Carrie Mae Weems, » Elad Lassry, » John Baldessari, » Kalup Linzy, » Liz Magic Laser, » Maren Hassinger, » Marianne Vitale, » Mika Tajima, » Terry Adkins  
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One Must
© » KADIST

John Baldessari

1997

In One Must , an image of a pair of scissors, accompanied by the words of work’s title, poses an ominous question about the relationship between the image and the text...

Pranayama D
© » KADIST

Mika Tajima

2017

Mika Tajima’s Pranayama sculptures are built from carved wood and chromed Jacuzzi jets and are presented as artefacts...

Men (055, 065)
© » KADIST

Elad Lassry

2012

The black-and-white photograph Men (055, 065) (2012) depicts two similarly built young men – young and slim, with dark tousled hair and a square jaw line – seated aside one another in identical outfits...

Person with Pillow: Desire, Lust, Fate
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John Baldessari

1991

The voids in Baldessari’s painted photographs are simultaneously positive and negative spaces, both additive and subtractive...

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Interview with Xaviera Simmons
© » KADIST

New York-based artist Xaviera Simmons and AFRO Charities executive director Savannah Wood introduce Nectar , on view at KADIST Paris from May 6th to July 24th 2022...

Xaviera Simmons, Nectar - Konsthall C
© » KADIST

After a presentation at KADIST Paris in Spring 2022, Xaviera Simmons’ solo exhibition “Nectar” travels to Konsthall C, Stockholm, Sweden...

Xaviera Simmons, Nectar
© » KADIST

KADIST presents Nectar , a solo exhibition by New York-based artist Xaviera Simmons...

Making Black Archives in Europe
© » KADIST

MAKING BLACK ARCHIVES IN EUROPE How do we make Black archives within western contexts? In this roundtable discussion, representatives from Afropea (France), Black Cultural Archives (UK), the Black Queer Archives (Netherlands) and Black Archives Sweden discussed their various approaches to autonomy, infrastructure, economics, and sustainability in creating and maintaining Black archives within Europe...