Author Archives: Christina

I Called Him Morgan screening
The murder of jazz trumpeter, Lee Morgan, by his wife.

Westbeth Community Room
July 16, 2021 at 7PM
FREE

I Called Him Morgan is a 2016 Swedish produced documentary film written and directed by Kasper Collin which gives an account of the life of and relation between jazz trumpeter Lee Morgan and his common-law wife Helen Morgan, later responsible for his murder in February 1972.

In Los Angeles Times critic Kenneth Turan noted: “Artistic, obsessive and intoxicating, “I Called Him Morgan” is a documentary with a creative soul, and that makes all the difference. Using a dazzling blend of cinematic tools, aural as well as visual, Collin recreates both individual lives and an entire world. As a slice of recovered and illuminated time, “I Called Him Morgan” has few peers. /…/ The film’s centerpiece interview is an arresting one-of-a-kind narrative that Helen Morgan herself recorded on a cassette-tape recorder a month before she died. Speaking with writer and teacher Larry Reni Thomas, she details her difficult life, her relationship with Morgan and how and why she came to shoot him at a Manhattan jazz club named Slugs in the midst of a blizzard so terrible that it delayed ambulances, contributing to her husband’s death. What makes “Morgan” such an exceptional film is that Collin, with a combination of good fortune and great skill, has built on this excellent verbal foundation with transfixing visuals that set a powerful mood. Regardless of whether you care deeply about jazz, the poetry of Collin’s filmmaking and the poignancy of the couple’s story will win you over. As a piece of history and a personal journey, “I Called Him Morgan” is cinema to cherish.

Edward Lee Morgan (July 10, 1938 – February 19, 1972) was an American jazz trumpeter and composer
One of the key hard bop musicians of the 1960s, Morgan came to prominence in his late teens, recording on John Coltrane’s Blue Train (1957) and with the band of drummer Art Blakey before launching a solo career. Morgan stayed with Blakey until 1961 and started to record as leader in the late ’50s. His song “The Sidewinder”, on the album of the same name, became a surprise crossover hit on the pop and R&B charts in 1964, while Morgan’s recordings found him touching on other styles of music as his artistry matured. Soon after The Sidewinder was released, Morgan rejoined Blakey for a short period. After leaving Blakey for the final time, Morgan continued to work prolifically as both a leader and a sideman with the likes of Hank Mobley and Wayne Shorter, becoming a cornerstone of the Blue Note label.

Michael Moss
Roots to Shoots in performance

Monday July 5, 2021
3:00PM – 4:30PM
AT THE PLAYGROUND
LITTLE ISLAND (located at 14th St and the Hudson River)

*Performance is FREE but you need timed entry tickets for this event.
LINK for timed entry tickets.*https://littleisland.org/timed-entry-reservations/

SO EXCITED TO INTRODUCE MY NEW BAND, ROOTS TO SHOOTS

Michael Moss (tenor and soprano saxes, flute), Alexis Marcelo (keys),
Adam Lane (bass), Michael Wimberly (djembe, African percussion),
Ismael Baiz (congos, bongos, South American percussion)

FYI: We also have been invited to perform again at Little Island on Wednesday, September 8th at
6 pm in the Glade — letting you know way in advance!

Gerald Monroe

Gerald Monroe
1926-2021
Painter

Website
Smithsonian Archives of American Art
Obituary

Su Zen
FogSeries
Photography

Chase Bank 302 W 12 St NY, NY
Opening Reception, Thursday, July 1, 2021, 3:00-5:00PM

July 1 – 31, 2021 •:
Mon – Fri 9am – 5pm; Sat – 10am-3pm

Celebrating her 50th anniversary living in Greenwich Village’s historical Westbeth Artist Housing photographer, SuZen, will be exhibiting her evocative, dream-like color landscapes, taken along the Hudson River and other places, capture ethereal atmospheric realms to enter. Fog, usually associated with the unknown, is much like our living in the pandemic. Its veils of Reality and Illusion have been SuZen’s constant artistic exploration. The FOGseries is a culmination of her ongoing theme of Light & Spirit.

The trajectory of her art from the darkroom and galleries and museums exhibitions to gracing Times Square with her 40’ x 25’ painted mural, Flowing Light, transformed her artistic energy into NYC’s public arena. In 1982, she founded, Art for the People – bringing artists together creating numerous inter-arts events with installations and performances in such NYC iconic venues as the World Trade Center, JFK Airport, Port Authority Bus Terminal and Central Park, with grants from National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council for the Arts and New York Foundation for the Arts.

Her artwork is exhibited and collected internationally. Most recently, during lockdown in Portugal, she wrote a book, “Things I Learned Along the Way”, which is available on Amazon (bit.ly/Things_Learned).

Huguette Martel
painter, writer

Susan Berger Mixed Media artist

Hillhouse High School’s Song. Fiber mixed media 2020

2021 FAR & WIDE National
Juried by Nicelle Beauchene & Franklin Parrasch
June 4-July 18, 2021

The third annual FAR & WIDE National exhibition, on view in the Main Gallery, is organized around the concept of Art Brut, a French term translating to ‘raw art’, to describe works made outside the academic tradition of art making. The exhibition comprises work by twenty-five artists, selected through a national call and juried by Nicelle Beauchene and Franklin Parrasch, co-founders of Parts & Labor in Beacon, NY. For this exhibition, the jurors sought works that incorporate a unique use of materiality and modes of expression, as well as works outside the conventional dictates of the art world.

Woodstock Artists Association and Museum
Woodstock, New York

Susan Berger
“I began as a painter and sculptor. I later delved into used mixed media working mostly in fiber/yarns. I use a variety of materials and combine different rug hooking, latch hooking and weave stitching into my works. The subject matter of each work determines the type of materials I will use and the fiber medium I will go forward executing in these works. My art pieces are well researched and painstakingly pursued in detailed and labor-intensive undertakings. I tend to do studies and my drawings are finished works of their own. I have been influenced by Native American design and by women who did samplers in early America and later in the industrial period where women worked in factories and left their homes in rural areas to the city.

This is a journey called: “1962: A Yearbook.” The pages are reconstructed of one’s own memory and you go from the beginning of the namesake of its dedication in the yearbook – a picture of the school building; and the boy’s on one side and the girl’s on the other side. It is neatly packaged representing the times in a cultural and political sense. My own entry has been rewritten and we learn who are the overachievers and like myself the underachievers. I look to celebrate the less popular because they had their own identity and recognized them now.
Again, it is interesting how we look at memory/remembrance and time does play tricks on us and the past always looks better. A memoir is the length of time over which one’s memory extends and each of the events enters our remembrance and we reminiscence.

More about Susan Berger here

Debra Jenks
Poetry and Art

UP AGAINST A WALL
Curated by Susan Breitsch
Awbury Arboretum Cope House
Germantown, PA
July 6 – August 26, 2021
aubury.org

Deb Jenks’ print “Coffee Shop” is included in the show.

Debra Jenks poem, “P-Shooters”, appears in issue 15 of Maintenant: A Journal of Contemporary Dada Writing and Art

Maintenant is an annual journal that features the most significant contemporary dada writing and art from around the world. Inspired by the original Maintenant, an irreverent and risk-taking ‘zine published, edited and allegedly written by Arthur Cravan from 1913-1917, the Three Rooms Press editions aim to bring to light cutting-edge poetry and art that stems from this original spirit. Since 2005, Three Rooms Press’ Maintenant has developed an international reputation as a primary source for Dada work by well-known and emerging artists.

Debra Jenks is an interdisciplinary artist, writer and educator whose work includes, sculpture, photography, drawing, video, performance and ephemeral public projects that meld fictive and autobiographical narratives. Her art reviews have appeared in The Brooklyn Rail, Chelsea Now, The Villager and Downtown Express, and her poetry has appeared in Pierogi Press, CLWN WR, Live Mag! and Tiny Spoon Lit Mag.

More information: Debra Jenks