About this Event
The Mike Kelley Gallery at Beyond Baroque presents 17 Place Vendôme by Vincent Johnson. In the exhibition and accompanying discussions, Johnson documents the foundations of the modern art world in the brutality of the slave trade.
The exhibition takes its name from the home of the most significant gallery for 20th century European Modernism. Both the history of the physical address, and the arts ecosystem it housed, cannot be separated from the slave trade. 17 Place Vendôme had been the 17th century palace of Antoine Crozat, the wealthiest slave owner in French history and the country’s first billionaire. His younger brother, Pierre Crozat, was a connoisseur and patron of art, and acquired the greatest art collection of the the 18th century. This collection formed the core of the paintings in the Hermitage after being purchased by Catherine the Great. Meanwhile, the catalog raisonné was invented in the Pierre Crozat palatial dwelling in Paris, while conversations about art moved from the Palace of Versailles to Pierre’s.
Through wide-ranging scholarship and a series of collages, Johnson resituates the social, financial, intellectual, and physical architecture of Western Art in the profound violence enacted by European and North American slavers.
The exhibition opens on May 4 with a reception and a discussion between Johnson and art historian Nizan Shaked, moderated by Renée Petropolous.
Opening Reception: 2:00 PM - 6:00 PM
Artist Conversation: 3:30 - 4:30 PM
About the artists:
Vincent Johnson is an artist and writer based in Los Angeles. His photographic works and paintings engage both significant and neglected historical subjects and are based on intensive research. He received his MFA from Art Center College of Design in 1997. He has exhibited widely, including P.S.1. Museum, the SK Stiftung in Cologne, Santa Monica Museum of Art, the Studio Museum in Harlem, and LAXART. Johnson has developed important thematic analyses both through writing and photography of North American cities. His in-depth study of urban transformation and erasure has expanded into other areas of his creative practice, whether it is research, cultural review or documentation of media and its relationship to history and culture. He is currently photographing Southern domestic and plantation architecture and related cultural artifacts in the Deep South while doing what he calls "The Grand Tour of the Confederacy.
Nizan Shaked is author of Museums and Wealth: The Politics of Contemporary Art Collections (Bloomsbury, 2022) and The Synthetic Proposition: Conceptualism and the Political Referent in Contemporary Art (Manchester University Press, 2017). Her article “Museums After Value-Form Theory,” is forthcoming in the Routledge Companion to Marxism in Art History. Select articles include: “American Monument: Race and Class” in Oxford Art Journal, “Getting to a Baseline on Identity Politics: the Marxist Debate,” in the Routledge Companion to African American Art History, “Propositions to Politics: Adrian Piper’s Conceptual Artwork,” in Adrian Piper: A Reader(New York: The Museum of Modern Art), and “Is Identity a Method? A Study of Queer Feminist Praxis,” in Otherwise: Imagining Queer Feminist Art Histories (Manchester University Press). She is a professor of contemporary art history, museum and curatorial studies, at California State University Long Beach.
This event is Free & In-Person at Beyond Baroque. Masks are encouraged while inside our center.
Event attendees are expected to behave in a respectful and considerate manner while in our space. Beyond Baroque reserves the right to remove individuals from our events, virtual or otherwise, if they are not respecting the space, fellow attendees, or performers.
Because this is a free event seating is limited. Please arrive early.
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center, 681 Venice Blvd, Los Angeles, United States
USD 0.00
