For centuries, artists have wrestled with how to incorporate spirituality into their work. This question is no less relevant for artists living in today’s postcolonial, postmodern era. Co-organized by The Menil Collection and P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center, the exhibition “NeoHooDoo: Art for a Forgotten Faith” brings together an intergenerational group of artists who address ritual in the artistic process and the wider implications of spirituality in contemporary art.
Visual artists have long engaged in a dialogue with the ritual traditions of shamans and griots, or oral historians. The term “HooDoo,” which originated in nineteenth-century America, refers to folk traditions derived from the Haitian religion of Vodun, itself preceded by the religion and culture of the Yoruba people of present-day Nigeria.
Challenging conceptions of “insider” and “outsider” art, the artists in the exhibition frequently create work using everyday objects that resonate both within the confines of a gallery or museum and among members of their own local audiences, who may or may not visit art institutions. Situating their work in a vernacular aesthetic often allows the meaning of the work to fluctuate according to its context. In the art of William Cordova (b. 1972) and Dario Robleto (b. 1972), history is remixed with allusions to music and with a distanced view of the past, both artists discussing the genocide of native peoples (in Peru and the United States, respectively) in the name of manifest destiny.
While the emphasis of the exhibition is on sculpture and the three-dimensional experience of walking around art, there are photographic works addressing themes such as slavery and colonization, work that engages with the ideas espoused in Michael Harris’s words: “There are migrations and there are Middle Passages. The differences are phenomenal and phenomenological.”
The exhibition is generously supported by The Brown Foundation, Inc., William J. Hill, Beth and Rick Schnieders, Michael Zilkha, The Cullen Foundation, Houston Endowment, and the City of Houston.
Marepe
Halo (Auréolas), 2004
Cruz De La Paz Sagrada [Cross of the Sacred Peace], 1980
The Menil Collection
© Michael Tracy
