Edges of Ailey/The Last Gullah Islands

[Wilfrid]

Edges of Ailey occupying a full floor of The Whitney. It's a must-see, but it's a curious hybrid, like two shows overlapping slightly. You have big screens on the upper part of the gallery walls showing a constant montage of Ailey's dancework, and the side galleries at each end of the floor are filled with Ailey ephemera -- notebooks, programs, posters. Everything an Ailey fan could want.

The floor is mainly filled with Black American art from the last hundred years. Certainly, there are pieces directly relevant to Ailey and his practice, like portraits of his dancers; but I would say most of the work is connected to Ailey only because it's by Black artists. Much of it predates Ailey's fame and some even predates his life.

But it's a great show. Bearden, Lawrence, Walker. William H. Johnson and I am sure "Moon Over Harlem": was in the Met's Harlem Renaissance show. Brought up short by an anxious man painting by Rashid Johnson: "I have seen this somewhere recently." Duh, it's linked to in Johnson's profile in the current New Yorker (on the app, not the print edition).

I even found a Clementine Hunter (see below -- I discovered her in New Orleans). Two artists that struck me: Purvis Young and Sam Doyle. Doyle was from one of the South Caroline Gullah Islands, and right upstairs at The Whitney is a small presentation of photos from the remaining island communities taken in 1979 by Jeanne Moutoussamy-Ashe. I only wish that was a bigger show. I didn't need the Ailey show to be any bigger.

Good time to visit.

[bloviatrix]

The Ailey show is definitely on my must-see list. Last we saw company perform. The evening included the world premiere of a new piece called Many Angels. It was thrilling to introduce the boy to Revelations.