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Artists are often steered into a particular lane or style to develop a core identity, and sometimes encouraged to stick with doing more of the same, giving audiences more of what they’ve come to expect and what’s worked before. Despite this pressure, many artists will say that some of the biggest joys of their work come when they experiment with new media and test new ways of thinking. That joy is apparent in Am I the Past, Am I the Future at Transformer, a show that mines the participants’ past work and experiences while imagining different paths for their personal and artistic futures.
For 20 years, Transformer has hosted the Exercises for Emerging Artists mentorship program, which annually steeps the participating artists in a different discipline. This year’s cohort immersed themselves in printmaking with guidance and history lessons from two local institutions, Hyattsville’s Pyramid Atlantic Art Center and the University of Maryland print shop, along with mentorship from local multidisciplinary artist Rose Jaffe. The resulting showcase includes a strong individual body of work from each participant, as well as some fascinating group collaborations.
A trio of delicate prints by Shyama Kuver use imagery of astrology, travel, and the natural world to convey interconnectedness and the pursuit of a sense of selfhood. A mythological personification blows across one print, its breath seeming to move both the antique ship and the rocket that glides across the cosmos of the background. Influenced by her multi-threaded ancestral past as well as her experimentation across disciplines, Kuver’s work suggests forging one’s path and the pursuit of selfhood.
Jeanette Bolden’s prints are united by a shape that recalls a mountain or a portal. A pair of prints segment images of both industry and nature, shunted into separate frames in the composition: these prints are photorealistic and crisp. The others contain layers of stylized interlocking birds and botanicals, the ink applied so thickly that it almost seems embossed in places. The contrast between the two types hints at two opposing printmaking approaches—the traditional method of applying layers of ink as thinly as possible to achieve a flat print, and bucking the rules to let the material properties of the ink take over.
Bodies and portraits dominate the work of Korey Richardson, whose pieces draw from historic African American motifs and Afrofuturist ideas. A set of portraits of prominent figures, including Angela Davis and Questlove, depicts their afros overlaid with a bloom of intricate line work composing words, images, and patterns. On another poster, a grouping of smaller icons and images are arranged in a grid, including miniature portraits and a Black power fist, some appearing as pairs. These evocative and momentous figures are imbued with meaning and tap into collective memory and identity.
In Varvara Sergeevna Tokareva’s screen-printed scenes, B-movie monsters, and damsels in distress mingle with soda bottles and comic book exclamations. Some of these are printed in fully saturated, four-color process glory, while others are entirely black and white or have just a choice swatch of color to highlight one area. Her work explores the visual language of advertising and pop culture, often revealing the ridiculous and insidious nature of capitalism and commerce.
These individual works are tied together by a collaborative mural of colorful shapes that covers the wall and runs behind the hangings, as well as two collaborative prints, in which each participant contributed a layer to the final design. Some of these images echo motifs of individual artists, like Kuver’s lotus pods and Bolden’s mountain shape, while others are less recognizable. These same motifs are repeated on window clings on the front of the building, showing the throughlines of this collaborative project and beckoning passersby to come in and share in the experience.
Am I the Past, Am I the Future runs through August 18 at Transformer. Wednesday through Saturday, noon to 6 p.m. transformerdc.org. Free.
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