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New 25 foot-tall statue unveiled in NYC, Rockefeller Center to honor "African culture"

Ms Vandross

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The statue was made by African-American artist Sanford Biggers




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Ambi D

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The thing about Sanford Biggers is he comments on racism using popular iconography and irony. So sculpture is basically a comment on how the Smithsonian is racist and presents these racist trauma “African” images in their magazine. I don’t think the Smithsonian is in on the joke tho. Think Spike Lee’s bamboozled.
Here is some of his other work.
15_12_00_sanford_biggers_laocoon_10x5x6ft_ssbobj052.jpg

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LoveyDove

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Hmm...


In the coming weeks, Oracle will also begin to live up to its name with the launch of an interactive component allowing viewers to consult the sculpture about their future after activating a QR code. The sculpture will be voiced by “various celebrities,” according to Biggers, although he declined to name names.

Visitors will be able to ask the oracle anything they want, and if the oracle is “in,” they’ll get a live response from the day’s celebrity.

“They’ll respond as an oracle would,” Biggers said, “in mysterious, poetic vagaries which will hopefully be, if not helpful, at least mystifying.”


Chile, I guess...
 

Ms Vandross

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The thing about Sanford Biggers is he plays with the irony of racism using racist popular iconography. So this is a comment on how the Smithsonian is racist.
15_12_00_sanford_biggers_laocoon_10x5x6ft_ssbobj052.jpg

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I'll admit, my first reaction was:

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But I think it looks interesting. The description is dumb though, don't see what this has to do with "African culture". Perhaps the traditional West/Central African mask style.
 

Lolaland

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WTF is "African culture"? Typical homogenization of Africa/Africans by westerners. Whatever that thing is, it's hideous-looking!

And why is an African American artist making statues to represent "African culture" (whatever that is). If this were the other way around, we would never hear the end of it.
 
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Home23

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WTF is "African culture"? Typical homogenization of Africa/Africans. Whatever that thing is, it's hideous-looking!

And why is an African American artist making statues to represent "African culture" (whatever that is). If this were the other way around, we would never hear the end of it.

Im AA and I def agree. There’s so much AA stories, images, folklore etc. that he could’ve drew inspiration from, why use this platform and opportunity to do an African statue? Leave that to the Africans. Furthermore, there isn’t one singular African culture so who/what exactly is he depicting?
 

AA1forever

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Is this for Africans or Black Americans? Either way this sucks!

Which African artistic style is this mimicking?

Why celebrities(Many which will probably be black Americans)?
I have a feeling white folks will be apart of this somehow.

No explanation could make this seem okay!
 

jheri

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the artist's description:

The 25-foot bronze sculpture ‘Oracle’ is a continuation of Biggers’ recent ‘Chimera’ sculptures, a series of figurative sculptures created by combining African masks and European figures that explore historical depictions of the body and their subsequent myths, narratives, perceptions, and power. This sculpture will be the artist’s largest-scale commission to date.
 
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What in the homunculus hell is this? It looks like an evil impish creature. It looks like if you walk by it at midnight or under a full moon it will open its eyes and lock eyes with and prevent you from leaving until you correctly answer its riddle.
 

Bjxxxx

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Is this for Africans or Black Americans? Either way this sucks!

Which African artistic style is this mimicking?

Why celebrities(Many which will probably be black Americans)?
I have a feeling white folks will be apart of this somehow.

No explanation could make this seem okay!
They will love it and talk about how progressive they are to put that monstrosity in Rockerfeller Center. Now if it were inside in the Rockerfeller collection, that might be one thing, however it does not have the ethos of many of those pieces. It looks cartoonish.
 

saywhatyouwant

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So sculpture is basically a comment on how the Smithsonian is racist and presents these racist trauma “African” images in their magazine. I don’t think the Smithsonian is in on the joke tho.

And apparently, neither are the Africans...

I don't mind his message but I'm not sure it translates.
 

EchoLake

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Sigh, it's exactly what I expected. We couldn't get a statue of Shango instead? Something the whole diaspora understands instead of constantly going for shock value that centers the white gaze. I studied art criticism in college, and frankly it's tiring.
 

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But they’ll have one statue for Portuguese culture, one for Spanish culture, one for French culture, German culture, etc. Whatever I guess
TalkativeOrganicChevrotain-size_restricted.gif
 

Ambi D

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That’s really fine and well, but if someone needs a background in art to even get a semblance of your message and it’s supposed to be a piece that communicates something to the public I feel like it’s a wasted opportunity. Like it’s great to do this in museums where artsy people might not even see that he’s laughing at them or in more private high society places, but like this could have gone to someone who would make something that would make black people proud when they looked at it while walking past. Unfortunately this will just inspire ridicule, especially of African people. It’s not bad, but it is an interesting way of celebrating “African culture”.
Some people feel like all art should be able to be interpreted by any lay person and if it can’t then it’s too high brow. I don’t agree but I know that is a common view point.

I think what biggers is commenting that the premise of “African culture” is as false as this statue, and so is the ability of the Smithsonian to celebrated it because they basically made their millions off of African trauma and primitivism pδrn. I get that it may not come across if you’re not familiar with this artist and I guarantee all the tourist who walk past this in Rockefeller center will be 100% clueless. I’ll be interested in hearing what the Oracle has to say. My guess is something very subversive. We’ll see.
 

BrwnSknBeauty

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WTF is "African culture"? Typical homogenization of Africa/Africans by westerners. Whatever that thing is, it's hideous-looking!

And why is an African American artist making statues to represent "African culture" (whatever that is). If this were the other way around, we would never hear the end of it.
Same reason African are taking African American roles in movies and theater.
 

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