MANIFESTO

#64

MUSE TWENTY FANZINE

"FIGURES OF SPEECH"

2022.09.13

The Brooklyn Museum hosts until January 29, 2023 Virgil Abloh: “Figures of Speech”, a reminder that the art has no limit and live to infinity. 

The multidisciplinary work of late visionary artist and designer Virgil Abloh (Rockford, Illinois, 1980–2021, Chicago, Illinois) has reshaped how we understand the role of fashion, art, design, and music in contemporary culture. Virgil Abloh: “Figures of Speech,” developed by the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, is the first museum exhibition devoted to Abloh’s work and spans two decades of his practice, including collaborations with artist Takashi Murakami, musician Kanye West, and architect Rem Koolhaas, among others; any kind of materials from his fashion label Off-White; and items designed for Maison Louis Vuitton. Newly added for the Brooklyn Museum’s presentation are never-before-seen objects from the artist’s archive, as well as a “social sculpture,” which draws upon Abloh’s background in architecture. The installation offers a space for gathering and performances, and is designed to counter the historical lack of freedom of expression afforded to Black artists and Black people in cultural institutions. “Figures of Speech” traces Abloh’s exploration of the communicative power of design. His use of language and quotation marks turns his designs, and the people who engage with them, into literal figures of speech. The artist uses the Black gaze to dismantle the traditionally white-crafted structures at work in fashion, design, architecture, and art, reconstructing new work through the lens of the Black cultural experience and typical elements of the street style, ambience where he grew up.

Above: “FUNCTIONAL ART,” 2021 Below: “PINK PANTHER,” 2019
T-shirt for Supreme c/o Virgil AblohTM, 2019

NIKKI MALOOF

AROUND THE CLOCK

2024.11.22

Beauty in everyday life

 

The mundane, the horrors, and everything in between, Maloof captures the everyday in her maximalist artworks.

SANG WOO KIM

THE SEER, THE SEEN

2024.11.21

Confronting his dual cultural upbringing, Sang Woo Kim invites us to pause, look, and question not just what we see, but how and why we see it.

news

THE 80S: PHOTOGRAPHING BRITAIN

2024.11.20

Recording a changing Britain and capturing social change. Tate Britain explores the medium of photography and how it became a tool for social representation, cultural celebration, and artistic expression throughout the ‘80s.

PHOTOGRAPHY

Roe Ethridge. Happy Birthday Louise Parker

2024.02.21

Returned to the city as an important space for cultural dissemination, the exhibition floor unveils to the public for the first time the first part of the program that interweaves – with an international gaze – visual arts, fashion, design and the publishing scene. An unprecedented experience of discovery and fruition takes visitors through the environments in an ascending climax.

Miranda July: New Society

2024.02.21

Osservatorio Prada presents the first exhibition dedicated to the work of Miranda July that traces the 30-year career of the American artist, filmmaker and writer through her short films, performances and installations.