Kalup Linzy
Notes from a Limerent
January 12, 2012–February 25, 2012The Breeder, Athens
The Breeder is pleased to present Kalup Linzy ‘s solo exhibition “Notes from A Limerent”. Linzy ‘ s seventh video from the series “Conversations Wit De Churen”, entitled “Notes from a Limerent” is presented along with large-scale photographs taken during the shooting of the film. All the material included in the show were part of Kalup Linzy’s retrospective exhibition “Melodies, Drama, Limerence” that took place in La Conservera Center for Contemporary Art, Murcia, Spain in 2011.
Linzy has been creating videos for the series “Conversations Wit De Churen” since 2003, as part of his multi faceted practice that includes videos, performances, music, collage, photography and painting. The satirical plot of his videos are inspired by soap operas, telenovelas and Hollywood melodramas. Using the aesthetics and narrative form of soap opera, Linzy’s work addresses themes such as personal relationships, gender, sex and the contemporary art world. They are comical and raunchy at the same time and irony with a dramatic tension. “Conversations Wit De Churen VIII: Notes From a Limerent” is the fist video that Linzy participates in as a male character, apart from his usual appearance in drag.
According to art historian and curator Andrea Gilbert, Kalup Linzy mediates the politics of gender and race through videos, which he writes, designs and performs. Keenly aware of the role of the media in shaping societal perceptions, behaviors and fashions, Linzy taps the television genres of soap opera and situation comedy to create turgid mini-dramas that showcase his politicized portrayals. His personae, most of which he plays himself, are conflations of his upbringing in the African-American culture of the Southern United States (family and church ties, dialect, humor, music), as well as his experiences in the contemporary art world. Along with his African-American perspective, queerness is the most obvious aspect of Linzy’s work. In contrast to the female impersonation and drag performance that Greek audiences are familiar with, such as that of Lakis Lazopoulos, which is geared towards entertaining straight audiences by satirizing the types they know, Linzy uses parody to undermine the established authority of gender and sexuality and to question naturalized systems. Wearing rudimentary drag, often consisting only of a blatantly ill-fitting wig framing his unshaven face, he seamlessly transitions from male to female, or else dubs his own Southern-Black voice over those of male and female performers of other races. In both cases he succeeds in upending the values and norms of whiteness and heterosexuality.
Kalup Linzy was born in 1977 in Stuckey, Florida and lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. He has had solo exhibitions in The Moore Space, Miami, FL(2008); Taxter & Spengemann, New York, NY (2007); and P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City, NY (2006), The Breeder Playroom, Athens (2007). In 2009, the Studio Museum in Harlem honored Linzy with Kalup Linzy: If it Don’t Fit, the first museum survey of the artist’s work. In 2010 La Conservera Center for Contemporary Art in Murcia Spain hosted Linzy’s second retrospective exhibition. Linzy’s work has been included in Prospect.1 New Orleans Biennial curated by Dan Cameron. In 2008 works by Linzy were included in the exhibition “30 Americans”, Rubell Family Collection in Miami. Among the group shows that he has participated are: Glasgow International: Festival of Contemporary Visual Art, Glasgow, Scotland; Arcadia University Art Gallery, Glenside, PA; The Hydra School Project, Hydra, Greece; and The Hayward Gallery, London, UK. He has also been included in group exhibitions at Zacheta National Museum, Warsaw, Poland; Studio Museum, Harlem, NY; The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The El Salvador Biennial; Moscow Biennial, and The Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Australia, among others. He has performed and screened work at venues including The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival; British Film Institute, London, and Beursschouwburg, Brussels, Belgium. In 2010 Kalup Linzy created the duo “Kalup and Franco” with Hollywood actor James Franco and apart from their participation at soap operas (like General Hospital), they have presented several performances and have released an EP.
