This is the final OpenLab response of the semester. It is due April 20.
During our tour of “White Shoes”, we discussed how the photographs of the artist could be considered documentation of performance art. The artist placed herself in spaces in New York City that have legacies of enslavement. In this way, Faustine suggests that memories and histories can be held in places and things over time — in buildings, landscapes, and streets. Choose one image from the exhibit to answer the following questions (you can find images from the exhibition by searching for “White Shoes” Faustine on Google, and include a link to that image in your response):
What (hi)story does the place tell (separate from Faustine’s presence)? How does Faustine’s contemporary body speak with the history of the spaces that she inhabits? What is the dialogue between her body (and clothing and props) and the place? Does her presence reignite the past, or does her body create a new version of history or add something to the historical narrative?
https://www.nyartbeat.com/media/event/2018/2C66-620
In this picture, Nona Faustine can be seen in the middle of the sidewalk in nothing but a white dress covering her bottom half and holding a sign that says. “AR’NT I A WOMAN”. While I don’t know the exact location of where this photo is taken, it appears to be a street in a rural area. The angle of the photo doesn’t focus on any building in particular, but instead on the general area. With her presence here, she seems to suggest that while this street seems ordinary, this place does have history involving slavery. Her simple attire and sign seems to put a focus on her identity as a woman. Perhaps she could be saying that this is how some people expect the woman to be like and she protesting against that with her sign and her being out in public. This photo could be saying that something as simple and plain as the New York street she is standing in could be covering up some dark history underneath.
The Image I chose is where Faustine is at the Tweed Courthouse in New York City. The history of the place is one of corruption due to power. Faustine in this image is nude with only white shoes on using her body to display herself as someone who will stand up to the courthouse. She is trying to stand up against the corruption and injustice that is correlated to the place’s history. She is trying to remind people that this was a place of injustice. What I see being used in the image is juxtaposition. This is because it represents 2 sides. The corrupt courthouse represents one side displaying a history of abuse of power. Faustine represents the side that is standing up to this injustice. Faustine’s body represents this. Her body shows that she is resisting the courts’ oppression since she is pressing her hands against the column showing resistance. Faustine’s presence provides layers of meaning to the historical area, emphasizing the continuous problem which is the government’s abuse of power and corruption. Her presence does reignite the past. She uses the past to create a new version of history to spread awareness about this issue that needs to be addressed.
The series of photos from Nona Faustine’s “White shoes” that stuck out to me was the one in an apartment with her laying on top of the american flag with a table like coffin while an older person stares over at her body. The history of that place to me represents the amount of black bodies america is responsible for. Faustine’s body in this picture is stiff almost as if she’s dead, and the older person staring at her could be a parent mourning the injustice of what america has put generations of African americans through especially what we witnessed with black women like Sandra Bland, Breonna Taylor, Shelly Frey, etc. Nona wearing the white shoes on her feet symbolizing the white patriarchy while fully naked could be another point of the exploitation her body because that’s what also happened at slave auctions and to Sarah Baartman a woman who was took from south africa to be gawk at in a zoo fully naked. Her presence reignite the past in showing what is still happening in the present. The naked body is the sexual exploitation of black women due to the circumstances during slavery which is still a stereotype of black women being “hyper sexual”. Nona laying on that flag shows the foundation that america was built on. It’s not on purity as the shoes she wears it’s the labor and bodies of african americans, that history from america is trying to be erased.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WzlB0eZ9fBYGMnbtu7RZWNSTyOKajmt3HBMDZ-8rR_E/edit
The history of this place based on the photos tells me that this is an area that slaves would use as an escape route. Particularly because during slavery, escaped slaves would go into the forest to hide from their slave masters. Which is shown through Faustine facial expression, and body posture because her facial expression shows a look of worry, like someone is trying to capture her. All while the body posture is showing her holding a gun in case someone is trying to attack her. Additionally, the prop shows a gun, a flintlock to be exact to remind the viewer of the slavery era where people use flintlocks instead of autonomically shooting rifles.
Her presence creates a recent version of history due to her prop, a pistol being in her hand because usually when slaves are being chased, they do not have flintlocks with them. Although in this picture we can see Faustine with flintlocks, showing that she can defend herself if her attackers ever try to find her.
Links
Picture: https://www.dailyartmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/3-%C2%A9NonaFaustine-2016-1177-1536×1024.jpg
Website: https://www.dailyartmagazine.com/nona-faustine-white-shoes/
jacqueline flores D273
The photograph I used from the exhibit of White Shoes by Nona Faustine was where she lies on top of the American Flag. Showing the vulnerability of African Americans living in the United States as she lays on the American Flag representing American society how as they are strapped down and torn apart piece by piece for who they are. Faustine contemporary body speaks with history because it goes back to the fact they had no bodily autonomy back when they were slaves. Even now that African Americans are free citizens their boldly autonomy and how those around them are still determining their presence and existence in society. This photograph further adds to the historical narrative as it continues to exemplify the struggle African Americans will continue to have and currently have as society continues to view stereotypes associated with them in a negative light. They are being held back by systematic laws that don’t allow them to rise and succeed in a society like their white counterparts. Like their other minority counterparts, they are unable to economically succeed thereby being held by a vulnerable poor state for generations.
White Shoes
In Nona Faustine’s “White Shoes” series, the artist places herself within historical sites in New York City that are tied to the history of slavery, making a statement about memory, presence, and historical accountability. By photographing herself, often nude except for white shoes, at these sites, Faustine challenges us to reconsider these familiar landscapes and the histories they are portraying..
One powerful image from the series is taken at Tweed Courthouse in NYC, a location with historical significance. Faustine’s presence confronts the site’s legacy as a product of corrupt practices and by extension, its connection to the histories of slavery and colonialism. Her body and attire the stark white shoes dialogue with the space, symbolizing both a reclaiming of agency and a critique of historical and ongoing oppression.
Faustine’s work in “White Shoes” not only reignites the past but also questions how these historical narratives have been constructed and remembered. Placing her body in these spaces adds a critical layer to the historical narrative, suggesting a need to reconsider who is memorialized and how we engage with our history. Her presence is both an act of remembrance for those who suffered and a call to acknowledge and rectify the erasures in our public memory.
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Link to the Image
Faustine’s work incorporates and looks further into what the lives of Black people would have looked like in places where Africans were sold. In her self portraits, she visits sites in New York where there was a legacy of enslavement. She only tends to wear white shoes, which represent and speak upon the oppression and colonialism that African and Indigenous communities have faced nationally and globally. Other than the shoes and occasional props, she is nude most of the time which allows her to become vulnerable at that moment, and the message behind it is that she is standing in solidarity with the ancestors whose body and memories allowed the formation of the land that is present beneath her. Faustine’s main goal is to shine a light into the hidden and traumatic history behind places, whose topics are being erased from public schools and to demonstrate the impact that the past has had to the present
The image I picked was Faustine at the African burial ground in Manhattan which is the location of the largest know slave burial site in America. Faustine’s presence serves as a reminder of the torment that those people went through as a result of slavery because even though she was born in Brooklyn, here ancestors likely shared roots with the individuals at the burial site. I would say that here presence here both serves as a reminder of the past and also adds to the narrative because she appears with flowers and seems to be praying. It gives the impression that she is mourning these lost souls and sends a powerful message.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/02/style/nona-faustine-nude-photos-white-shoes-black-history/index.html
The representation of the environment Faustine used was to re-create a prime example of what slavery looked like starting from the clothes all the way down to the “white shoes” and props. To dive deeper in detail Faustine expressed emotion through these photographs by using her body language through different poses such as the photo of her standing on the crate in the middle of Manhattan, I would also mention another photo of her when Faustine was standing in front of the court house that was built on top of a cemetery of forgotten slaves. To sum it up I believe that Faustine’s approach to bringing awareness to history in a new perspective is creating a new version of history where we aren’t using any textbooks , however the use of art is creating a new space for artists to display their work in a judgement free environment.
underneath is the link for the photo you asked for.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thecut.com%2Farticle%2Fartist-nona-faustine-white-shoes-brooklyn-museum.html&psig=AOvVaw1XipZlpXwlDlhpscaBsc5Q&ust=1715357087155000&source=images&cd=vfe&opi=89978449&ved=0CBAQjRxqFwoTCLiR46H5gIYDFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE
10-©NonaFaustine-2021-9479.jpg
Observing the picture and the experience I had in the Brooklyn Museum, I can say this picture illustrates a sense of sadness because, in the United States, colored people were slaves and sometimes were obligated to stay at home to take care of their siblings. It is living without freedom.
The history told from the picture where she lies on the coffin tells the story of Sandra Bland, a 28 year old black woman who died suspiciously in police custody on July 13,2015. Her body speaks to each scene by showing the reality of the bodies that inhabited the area before the building that currently resides there. With this specific scene she lays on top of the coffin to show how the police were responsible for her death and instead of being covered up her body is in the light. I feel she added something to the historical narrative by trying to show the reality of the past in the best way she knows by using her body to portray the sometimes grim part of our history we sometimes try to hide.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F2024%2F04%2F02%2Fstyle%2Fnona-faustine-nude-photos-white-shoes-black-history%2Findex.html&psig=AOvVaw3MW_L9mb6zPKd6mNkx5vKL&ust=1716766977970000&source=images&cd=vfe&opi=89978449&ved=0CBIQjRxqFwoTCLCihcL9qYYDFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE
All graded