Beautiful People: Jiji Kikhia

Jiji Kikhia wears Jean Paul Gautier jumpsuit, Converse sneakers and a beautiful necklace made by a Indian artisan (if you are/know the maker of this piece, let us know!). 

Photo by Austin Phelps

 

Jiji Kikhia is half-Syrian, half-Libyan and was raised in France and the United States. Jiji studied International and Comparative Politics with a concentration on Human Rights, Development, and International Law at the American University of Paris. She is currently doing her masters in The Arts and Social Change at Gallatin with a focus on social work and healing arts. She mainly paints and draws with acrylic, ink, and charcoal, but is also experimenting with incorporating dance and body movement in her work. Her style is abstract and the subjects she is currently investigating are embodiment, identity, and the feminine. Jiji is committed to discovering and nurturing the different ways in which humanitarian aid and the healing arts merge, and how the creative process can be a vehicle for freedom and empowerment.

    ("She" and "Self Portrait" by Jiji Kikhia Art)

("The Curve" by Jiji Kikhia Art)

I explore how the arts can be used as a channel for increasing self-awareness and individual empowerment. In general, I want to create safe environments where people feel free to express themselves and to experience their own presence by heightening their senses, whether through dance, drawing, theatre, music, etc.
 

("Woman in Gold" by Jiji Kikhia Art)

("Woman #1" by Jiji Kikhia Art)

("Rays" by Jiji Kikhia Art)

Current Projects

Currently, I am working and volunteering at various arts organizations in New York City where I am learning as many skills as possible so that I can eventually lead my own workshops. I am eager to work with all types of populations, especially the youth around the world.

 

I have also been exploring the theme of embodiment and how transforming the surface of the human body transforms identity. As a painter and drawer, I am specifically interested in body painting and ornamentation, and how the human figure is used as a vessel of expression. I have recently started a project where I paint on the figures and faces of individuals and photo-document and film the process. This project has already been featured in Genevieve Curtis’s short film "Embodiment of Memory," which is a stop motion film that reveals the transformation of impromptu painting on the faces and figures of two women.

(Filmmaker and Director: Genevieve Curtis) 

In my paintings, by photo-documenting my painting process, I am taking the audience on a journey through the metamorphosis of lines that create a figure or face, symbolizing the creation of life and memory. The figure is adorned with countless celebratory marks and twists that echo the language of the cosmos, while also resembling body ornaments. The paintings portray the themes of embodiment and perspective, where a painful or traumatic scar for one individual is seen as equivalent to a minute impression in the constellation of life. As a result, instead of diminishing the significance of individual pain, these adornments reflect a holistic perspective of life, where the individual being is part of a greater, collective movement in our unbounded universe. I choose to decorate the skin and organs as if I was painting stars in the sky: detached, playful, and powerful.

Jiji's Relationship to Brazil

I am in love the country's music and culture. The country has a very rich history and includes many diverse cultures. I don't know much about Brazil on a deeper level, but like most people around the world, I am completely charmed by it. And although, I know that the country is going through difficult times now politically and socially, there is still something magical about that part of the world.

("Still Standing" by Jiji Kikhia Art)

Some of my favorite things about Brazil are the music, the festive and colorful culture, and its nature. 

Jiji and ReciclaGEM

Jiji is a phenomenal artist and generously modeled in our Bricolage: Making of the Collection video earlier this year. Jiji is a truly Beautiful Person to watch.


The Making of ReciclaGEM from Julia Gorbach on Vimeo.

Thank you, Jiji, for your beauty, artistry, talent and grace! You make our world better,

T*

Venezuela, Revolution and Public Art in Melbourne, Australia

Boa noite/Bom dia my readers,

Earlier in my stay here in Australia, I had the honor of sitting down with Victor Holder, Venezuela-born, Australia-based public artist and creative director of socially engaged artistic hub, 4 Dverse Studios.

On March 23, 2014, 4Dverse showcased Propaganda for Peace at Melbourne's Viva Victoria Multicultural Festival, an event dedicated to "the ultimate celebration of Victoria's awesome cultural diversity."

4Dverse Studios responded to the call. Initially, the plan was to bring Venezuela's Dancing Devils to Melbourne. The Dancing Devils, having recently been declared by the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as one of a select few intangible cultural human heritages, are a performance group that reflects both Spanish and African influences, syncretized in a performance that has come to represent one distinct aspect of Venezuela.

However, as many of you global and, particular, hemispheric readers may know, Venezuela has been in a state of duress for months now, and as a result any possibilities of bringing the Dancing Devils or any such group no longer became a possibility.

When thinking back at the moment where he and his Venezuelan collaborator, Ramon Martinez, had to quickly come up with an alternative project for their booth at the festival, he remarks, "We were so upset, so hurt, and so angry...to see all these videos of students being killed in the street that we were so emotional, we couldn’t talk about art. We could only talk about politics and the situation, and we said “Let’s do...let’s just be honest. Let’s do something that relates to this, and helps somehow.”

And that's how Propaganda for Peace began. In a festival dedicated to exploring multiculturalism, they wanted to represent the Venezuela that they were experiencing alongside the flat, cultural lens in which so many countries, Venezuela included, are presented through the lens of a multicultural experience to the rest of the world.


Propaganda For Peace from Balangara Films on Vimeo.

This blog post emerged not simply because this is an example of visceral public, socially engaged art speaking on an important reality of the Americas, but also because this work was subsequently shut down by the Viva Victoria Multicultural Festival team.

That begs the question as to what are the limits of a multicultural experience? Is it when we become uncomfortable by reality? What is the goal of a multicultural festival if the definition of multiculturalism is limited to what is pleasant and comfortable, and not what is?

Victor, while serving as Creative Director of 4Dverse, is also pursuing a Masters degree in Public Art at RMIT. In our brief interview reflecting on the multicultural installation Propoganda for Peace, and its subsequent shut down by the staff of a multicultural festival, Victor had these remarks to say about Propaganda for Peace:

[Propaganda for Peace] was a subversive art work. It was activism. And it was more a reminder to, for one hand, for Venezuelan people, it was a reminder of our essence, of our origin, our happy culture, of our vibrant culture, that has been lost lately under this war, this violence. Well, not lately, like fifteen years. We lost a bit the values of who we are as a culture. I’m surprised that even these days...even in the revolution of Venezuela, you can still see the happiness. But the happiness is being lost slowly...too much violence, too many people have been dying. So the painting is a reminder, the colors of the painting and all of the articles I put on there, was kind of iconographic of Venezuela. There is a famous singer, Simon Diaz, internationally famous for his poetry and his traditional songs, Miss Venezuela...They are always winning Miss Universe, the most beautiful women in the world, the famous baseball players are from Venezuela in America, and so on. You know?  And the technique I used in my painting is dripping painting, inspired by Jackson Pollack, but I created a new technique controlling the paint...I use hatching. I love hatching as a material because it reminds me of Latin America, because of its exportation of cafe and cocoa and all of that stuff...So I paint that material. Because the purpose of the artwork is to see through the painting, so if you get closer, you can kind of touch it as well. So the thickness of the painting and the texture of the textile will already make you [have] a relationship with the country...a kind of tactile thing, you know?

And, more generally, the role of public art:

The thing is, I have been kind of studying a bit of history and anthropology. To actually be able to do the public art, you know a lot of history. You learn a lot to see things deeply in history... I do public art for community, it’s just takes further investigation about that community, what’s happening there, what is the story of this place, what is this wall telling me about.


It's time we let the walls speak. That might be a faster way to peace than propaganda.

Public Artists Letting the Walls Speak,

T*

Thoughts behind Fall 2014 "Bricolage": Wangechi Mutu + The End of eating Everything

If you happened to catch the wonderful Black Star News article on my upcoming show, then you would have already been introduced to the theme of the collection.

If not, then let me share it with you.

Contemporary artist Wangechi Mutu has created hybrid bodies through her mixed media art that has spoken to me for years. They speak to my body, a physical and social body that I see represented in her work, they speak to my intellectual body, a body that mixes academic theory with spirituality, poetic mysticism with craftsmanship, and the moral body that seeks to create a more unified, peaceful world.

(Wangechi Mutu, "The Bride who Married a Camel's Head, 2009)

(Wangechi Mutu, "Misguided Little Unforgivable Hierarchies, 2005)

(Wangechi Mutu, "Riding Death in My Sleep," 2002)

(Wangechi Mutu, "Root of All Eves, 2010)

(Wangechi Mutu, "A Shady Promise," 2006)

In her most recent exhibition, A Fantastic Journey, originally commissioned by the Nasser Museum at Duke University, and now at the Brooklyn Museum, Mutu features her first animation project. The animation, entitled "The End of eating Everything" displays an amorphous, planetary, and violent body, embodied by performance artist, Santigold, as it navigates grey matter terrain and eats the last of what is left in the universe until it implodes.

(A brief clip of the 8 minute animation)

This animation did many things for many people and artists. But for me, it provoked me to explore what my solution is to the state of dire over-consumption in which we find our world. (According to Patagonia-founder, Yvon Chouinard, the United States alone uses the energy of seven planets! Now what do I do to not feel paralyzed and horrible but actively do SOMETHING about it?)

Bricolage is my solution. While the philosophy of ReciclaGEM or recycling materially and socially has been my primary focus since I began this project in 2010, "Bricolage" is a new approach which provides more room and space for creative and authentic solutions.

In my dire attempt to fit into the "activist" community, I have found myself growing into a consciously minded but moderately self-loathing artist. Creating to the point of dire exhaustion, becoming overwhelmed with guilt every time I turned on my sewing machine and let alone used a down jacket in the dead of winter.

However, I realized that in the same way that I do not judge or shame others for the complexity of their ethics, neither should I do the same to myself.

Bricolage is an attempt to fuse together the complexity of YOUR narrative in a way that fits your unique story, your unique purpose, and in essence creating a collage of your contributions to this planet in a way that mixes informed-reality with aspiration, resulting in inspiration.

Bricolage in French literally means "DIY," but has come to represent a whole school of thought on cultural syncretism, post colonial identity and an aesthetic of multi-chromatic, multi-textured and multi-historicized object art.

My collection will include original fashion design looks of amorphous silhouettes and textile palettes artfully woven together with textile scraps inspired by the colors and visual patterns of the animations. The textile scraps, quilted together into kinetic tapestries, will be molded into dynamic and assymetrical silhouettes, reflecting much of the asymmetry and dynamic body of the protagonist. The collection will also feature fabric made from renewable fibers such as recycled polyester, hemp embroidered and hand dyed with natural dyes and textures inspired by the animation and Mutu’s earlier work.

One day I hope "ReciclaGEM" is a term that comes to encompass the breadth of meaning which Bricolage does. But in the meantime, I shall begin this journey of hybrid artivism, where I feel more authentic, more human, and more equipped to carry the cause of exploring ethics in fashion for the long haul in a way that is sustainable for other people, animals, the planet, AND myself.

Thank you Wangechi for creating work that inspires me to be more human(e) with myself.

The Afro-Futurist Dietary Vegan who Hand Dyes Silk, Recycled Hemp, and Found Materials with Natural Dyes, inspired by Political and Social Realities and who Believes in Fashion as more an Experiential Joy than a Commercial Practice, who loves to Travel while being Conscious of Material Usage, doesn't sign Petitions but Loves to Spread Love the best Way She Can,

T*

I would love to be in dialogue with you about this idea of hybrid activism. Feel free to comment below, or speak with me in person next Friday February 28 7-10pm at 1 Washington Square Place, NYC (RSVP here: http://gallatin.nyu.edu/utilities/events/2014/02/gallatinfashionshow.html)

Artist Highlight: Miki Katagiri | Hatmaking as Sculpture

Today, I had the amazing pleasure to meet former junk-artist, current hat-sculpting activist artist, Miki Katagiri, in her Williamsburg studio. Miki and I met at the Eyebeam Gallery last week at the Carrie Mae Rose Computational Fashion opening. Miki was wearing this hat, and my friend, Helese, stopped her and complimented her on her amazing style, after which I joined the conversation. She went on to explain the significance of the hat; the internal battle of youth struggling between two thought paradigms: love or prestige, the "heart" or the "castle." With the style, uniqueness, craftsmanship, and activist message, I had to know more. After an email exchange, she invited me for tea and great conversation in her studio.

 (The story behind this piece? You need to break through 

the repetitive "record" of life to move forward).

Miki relocated to New York City from her hometown of Tokyo 24 years ago, and has been a practicing artist ever since. She began creating what she describes as "junk art," art reclaimed from the environment, sculptures of refuse, monuments crafted with the unique remains of all the environments that she collected from. Miki says that her mother, a visionary woman and artist who created everything from handbags made from discarded umbrellas to elegant pouches made from reclaimed obi belts, inspired much of her interest in reclaimed materials.

(A beautiful pouch made from a reclaimed obi belt, made by 

her mother who has inspired much of her interested in reclaimed art)

Miki participated in many art shows, including one group show called " Urban Jungle," where the entire collection was purchased by legendary 1980s/1990s boutique, Unique (You might remember this boutique from Isabel Toledo's memoir, Roots of Style). From her junk art days, when asked what type of art she created, Miki would respond, "It depends on the street."

Over the past ten years however, she has created hats as sculpture. While by day she may be a hat designer at Ralph Lauren and Patricia Underwood, or a hat instructor at Parsons at the New School for Design, by night she is creating powerful, prolific sculptures that speak narratives of environmentalism, social justice, and the complexities of the human spirit. What else should you have on the sacred crown of your head, other than a work of art that can speak your values for you?

With some freshly brewed black bean tea in hand, I had the opportunity to iPhonegraph some of Miki's dialogic works for art:

 

 (See the art hidden within?)

 (Not all of her pieces are explicitly political. For instance, this hat, adorned with suspended falling leaves, is simply and elegantly inspired by the season, Fall)

(Wear this hat, and you can take out small felt hearts from the top and give out love to everyone you pass along your merry way. Think loving thoughts and spread the love around, literally!)

(311: a reminder of the aftermath that continues to be experienced as a result of March 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan. To this day in October 2013, Japan and now Hawaii and California are faced with radioactive leaks that put many in danger. Our planet needs us. And this piece reminds us that caring for each other in the aftermath is as critical as during the event itself.)

(

(Even the vegan in me appreciated these. The first is made from reclaimed fox fur. However, instead of merely using the animal and not acknowledging the life lost, Miki created a hat inspired by the fox dreaming of being a bird in its second life. The second piece, created from reclaimed beaver fur, is inspired by a beaver dreaming of being a tree in its second life. What if ever fashion product created from animals did this? So brilliant).

(Deforestation and the lone animal searching for shelter. Enough said).

There are so many more brilliant pieces, such as the ones inspired by the process of oxygenation, created with live plants that convert carbon dioxide into oxygen right on your head. I invite you and encourage you to look through her website and blog. The works truly do speak for themselves.

**A SPECIAL INVITATION**

If you are in New York on Monday November 4th, Wednesday November 6th, and Monday November 11th, you will have the amazing opportunity to attend a workshop with Miki firsthand at noneother than the Ggrippo Art + Design Gallery in Williamsburg.

Let's create some powerful, world-changing, hat sculptures together,

T*

Artist Highlight: Johannes Zits

 

("Embodying Nature: Relating to Geography")

Boa tarde, my readers,

It is only fitting that I follow the workshop on Fashion and Embodiment with a series of posts that highlight artists who are addressing those very subjects. For while fashion is a word we are all familiar with, embodiment is the very essence that we are talking about.

And one of such artists is Johannes Zits, Toronto-based but globally prolific, who engages the subjects of embodiment, textiles, and garments in ways that extend beyond the word "fashion" but, in the words of my dear friend and muse, Randal Jacobs, become "high concept."

I first met Johannes in the lobby of SESC-Vila Mariana of São Paulo after watching him, day by day, over the course of the Hemispheric Institute's Encuentro conference, shred his suit jacket to pieces and weave it into a loin cloth.

 

This loin cloth then became revived once again as the embodied action in the trees of the Praça Roosevelt in São Paulo, similar to another performance  "I'm not slim." which he staged in Callejon de Mesones, "a gentrified section" in Centro Histórico, Mexico City.



These pieces  represent but a myriad of ways that he has engaged art viewer and audience in subtle engagements facilitated through the interaction of his body with the environment, urban, natural, remote, gentrified, diverse, provincial- environments are ripe with connotations and opportunities for activist engagement.

What dare I say of this praxis??

A lot. Johannes has been practicing for two decades. His work has explored via his material surroundings subjectivity, corporeality, nudity and cloth. Cloth is a language through which he paints narratives of discourse, some pre-defined, others, open to the reinterpretation and re-envisioning of the viewer. The narratives are then recommunicated through the media of photography, live installations, performances, videos, actions, and last but certainly not least, textile bricolage.

Similar to El Anatsui, some of his work involves recycled materials because of his sheer interest in the medium and the performance of reinterpretation instead of an explicit environmentalist statement. Nonetheless, because of his intimate connection with the material, whether the re-envisioned fabric scrap, nature or his nude body in concert with these natural and reclaimed materials, his work still illuminates, perhaps inadvertently, questions of consumption, excess, and human living that either is amenable or sharply contrasts that of the natural earth.

("Re-Dressing Landscape")

While in Toronto for Fashion Art Toronto earlier this year, an event at which he also presented, I had the amazing opportunity to meet with Johannes in his beautiful studio  and view some of the latest textile works that inform much of his performance.

"The Marriage Quilt"

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bricolage is a powerful medium to re-engage the mind on the power of embodiment.

Inspired by artists such as Johannes Zits, El Anatsui, Jean Michel Basquiat, David Hammons, and Wangechi Mutu, among many others, I move foward with my ever evolving environment-inspired line, ReciclaGEM, through the crafting of my Fall 2014 Collection, entitled "Bricolage," created with the vision of reclaiming the discarded of our environment to become re-aquainted with it.

That is what Johannes and such artists have done in art and performance, and that is what I hope also do in fashion, with the worlds of performance, art and fashion being in symbiotic and consistent conversation with one another.

Peace, love, and embodiment,
T*

Post NYFW Amazingness: Join us at a Star-Studded Fair Trade Fundraiser

New York Fashion Week has officially come to a close, and I can safely say it has been a fabulous week. While there is always a flurry of activity and stress prior to a fashion show, Nimet Deg, Becky Bavinger, the whole team at the New York Fair Trade Coalition, and Kate Black of Magnifeco.com are AMAZING! And thus Fair Fashion Runway III went swimmingly well. Fashionistas and editors alike, such as Starre Vartan of EcoSalon (amazing article on the collection and event!), and Harriette Cole, formally of many publications include Ebony Magazine, were in the audience, alongside creative directors, fellow designers, art and industry models, and ethical fashion lovers alike. It was such an honor to showcase along such revolutionary, ethical, and majestic (yes, because that’s how I felt when I saw these pieces in person and in particular, with my line!) brands such as Natalie Frigo jewelry, Soko jewelry, not to mention the AMAZING custom makeup designed by Lacey Elliot using makeup from the Body Shop!

And most critically, Kate Black, the founder of Magnifeco.com, a leader, a vanguard, a maverick of her time, opened my collection with a brief introduction on GMOs, the fight we faced in Mexico and are continuing to face here and around the world, and ways to keep that perspective in mind when viewing the pieces. The "conversation" Sin Maíz No Hay Vida began and shall continue. 

(Photo Credits: Galo Delgado and Enrique Martin)

So much to say, but I write today to let you know of ANOTHER amazing ethical fashion event taking place next Thursday September 26th, platforming a fair trade fashion initiative and non profit based here in New York.

Wishwas is a Queens-based non profit organization created to assist immigrant women of limited financial resources in adjusting to living in New York City and train them in vocational practices such as garment and fashion good production to aid in their financial self-sufficiency. Next Thursday, they are hosting a fundraiser for their cause in the beautiful studios of internationally renown fashion designer Naeem Khan and jewelry designer Ranjana Khan. The evening will consist of fashion display of Naeem Khan’s beautiful Fall 2013 collection alongside live performances, cocktails and a silent auction.

Tickets for this star-studded (yes, I used it because that’s the word to use!) event are still available. Support this amazing organization, based here in Queens, assisting lives in meaningful ways, engaging in the revolution of the quotidien and enjoy the utopian glory that fashion offers- glamour, cocktails, celebrities, and the silent joy in knowing that you.are.there.

'Ze tickets are here: http://wishwasfundraiser2013.eventbrite.com

Peace, love, and glamour-activism,

T*