art: Cannon Hersey and Samson Mnisi
May 6, 2009 Leave a Comment
Cannon Hersey and Samson Mnisi
Works on Paper May 9th – June 10th, 2009
Opening reception: Saturday May 9th, 3 – 7pm
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: contact Sara Safiullah / Ra kaa Shabaka: 718-622-2201
The Scene gallery is pleased to present a two-person exhibition of works on paper by South African artist, Samson Mnisi and American artist, Cannon Hersey. Working in concert, they have brought their art across South Africa and the USA, to the UK, France, Brazil, Austria, and the Netherlands.
SAMSON MNISI work reflects his life as a youth, emerging as a man in a post apartheid South Africa. Infused with a tradition of ritual and tribal marking, his work captures the artistry derived from an ancient tradition of Sangoma empowerment symbols. It is these marks on paper, these scribe-like movements, which are now the remnant visuals of a post-colonial existence in his homeland.
CANNON HERSEY finds his work in art making through writing and photography and printmaking. As an artist recording, collaboration becomes the medium he uses to speak to issues of culture, image and idea. Through his work he creates an objective, that gives rise to a unified idea based in co-dependency. Together Mnisi and Hersey have organized large scale exhibitions, chaired discussions and panels on art, and community. They have forged a union founded in the art they make and a need to express a realization of the spaces they individually occupy. Their art and cultural creation challenges the audience to appreciate more, our co-dependency and the differences that make up who we are and where we are from.
A retrospective on the collaborative works of these artists is currently showing at Mocada in downtown Brooklyn.
Selected Collections for Hersey and Mnisi include: Joachim Esteve II, Joachim Esteve III, Jaques Marchais Museum of Fine Art, BMW, Dell Computers, Vodacom, Rand Merchant Bank, FUBA (Federated Union of Black Artists), Joubert Art Museum, Museum Africa, Johannesburg, Museum for African Art, New York City and Vassar College, NYU and Yale University.
