For the final episode of "New Additions," host Habiba Hopson speaks with writer and curator Diallo Simon-Ponte. Throughout their conversation, Hopson and Simon-Ponte listen to the artists previously interviewed in this podcast and explore the most pressing topics that arose in those discussions such as: why they became an artist, the role of memory, the importance of being part of the Studio Museum’s collection, and the resonance of culture and diaspora.
We’re so grateful to all the artists featured in this podcast: Tunji Adeniyi-Jones, Vladimir Cybil Charlier, Zora J Murff, Brandon Ndife, Nikita Gale, Derek Fordjour, Cassi Namoda, Jared Owens, and Garrett Bradley. That’s a wrap on season one of New Additions!
This episode features artist Garrett Bradley in conversation about her work “America” (2019).
Garrett Bradley weaves together cinematic and documentary video styles to create films that reflect real-life stories and everyday themes. Bradley's filmmaking is inspired by real-life stories from people in her hometown of New York City; Los Angeles, where she went to school; and New Orleans, where she is currently based. Bradley’s debut documentary feature-length film, “Time” (2020), was nominated for over fifty-seven awards and won twenty, including an Oscar nomination for Best Documentary (Feature) and a 2020 Peabody Award. Bradley became the first Black woman director to win Best Director at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival.
Projects: Garrett Bradley opened in November 2020 at the Museum of Modern Art. The exhibition was part of a multiyear partnership between the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Museum of Modern Art, and MoMA PS1. The Studio Museum acquired Bradley’s work in 2023.
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artists/garrett-bradley
This episode features artist Jared Owens in conversation about his work "Shadowboxing #3" (2022).
Jared Owens, a descendant of three generations of Harlemites, was born and raised in Rockland County, New York. Owens was encouraged towards the arts at a young age due to his family's collection of art objects and his public school's art program. Through a variety of media including painting, sculpture, and installation, Owens explores and makes visible the structures of confinement within our society, among many other themes. The painting in our collection, Shadowboxing #3, evidences Owens's use of a hand-crafted stamp based on the Brooks diagram, which is arguably the most circulated image associated with the slave trade in its abolition.
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artworks/shadowboxing-3
This episode features artist Cassi Namoda in conversation about her work "Landscape with child crossing the Styx" (2021). Namoda combines personal memories and art historical references to create rich visual narratives in her paintings. In this episode we are also joined by our fall 2024 curatorial intern Tarik Brown.
Originally from Mozambique, Namoda spent much of her childhood and adolescence living in several countries within and outside of Africa. She would often draw and record her observations during travels, laying the foundation for her artistic practice. Namoda went on to study cinematography, and eventually moved to Los Angeles, where she began to paint scenes from her upbringing. Namoda's peripatetic lifestyle, along with a sustained curiosity for history, has informed her ability to reference folklore, art history, mythology, and colonial structures in her practice.
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artists/cassi-namoda
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artworks/landscape-with-child-crossing-the-styx
This episode features artist Derek Fordjour in conversation about his work "Fly Away" (2020). Derek Fordjour’s paintings, sculptures, and installations render the fraught complexities of the Black American experience.
Born to Ghanaian immigrant parents in Memphis, Fordjour’s creative aptitude was present from a young age, though his path to artistry took a circuitous route. After briefly attending Pratt Institute, Fordjour took a break from his art education before attending and graduating from Morehouse College, Harvard University, and Hunter College. Fordjour’s artwork is layered with textures and intricate details. His themes include the tension between invisibility and hypervisibility, the expectations and spectacle of Black athletes, and the under-told narratives of Black performers and magicians.
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artists/derek-fordjour
This episode features Nikita Gale in conversation about the artist's work RUINER XIX (2022). Using various technologies often associated with construction or stagecraft, Gale interrogates the structures of labor, attention, and restriction. Born into a military family, Gale was raised between Anchorage, Alaska, and Atlanta, Georgia.
The artist’s mother’s instruments, father’s foam-board architectural models, and uncle’s drawings on cardboard, which he often gifted to Gale and other young relatives, are among Gale’s earliest memories of the arts. Gale’s parents’ careers within public space and performance directly reflect the artist’s own conceptual ideas and material choices. The artist’s installations feature aluminum trusses, stage lighting, instruments, and other objects commonly found at concerts. Gale explores the political nature of these objects, highlighting metal barricades, microphone stands, and concrete as having a shared history of performance and protest. The artist records the gestures of performance without including the performer in the final works, focusing instead on the mechanisms and structures that comprise the performance itself.
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artists/nikita-gale
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artworks/ruiner-xix
This episode features artist Brandon Ndife in conversation about his work "A Master’s Tools" (2022). Brandon Ndife’s works merge interior and exterior worlds, often breaking open hand-built domestic objects to reveal an undergrowth of organic forms.
Born in Hammond, Indiana, to Nigerian and Barbadian parents, Ndife's interest in the arts began at a young age, sparked while attending a high school for the arts and developed during his undergraduate education at the Cooper Union. At the Cooper Union in 2012, Ndife witnessed the upheaval and destruction brought by Hurricane Sandy to New York. The pervasive sight of discarded furniture left to the elements of natural disaster shifted Ndife‘s artistic focus, bringing themes of domesticity, commodification, decay, and environmental crisis to the forefront of his work. Ndife builds objects that share an uncanny resemblance to found second-hand furnishings and organic matter such as fruit, tree branches, and soil.
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artists/brandon-ndife
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artworks/a-masters-tools
This conversation features artist Zora J Murff in conversation about his work Garden with fruit (after Charles Ethan Porter).
Born and raised in Des Moines, Iowa, Artist and educator Zora J Murff studied photography at the University of Iowa while serving as a social worker for youth on court probation who were guided through therapy and community service as an alternative to incarceration. Murff explores the politics of stereotypes and anti-blackness through the medium of photography. As a prime example of Murff’s practice as an artist, educator, and storyteller, Murff’s photographs showcase and unearth hidden histories, offering visual investigations of Black life—its horrors and joys.
Garden with Fruit (After Charles Ethan Porter), 2020. Archival Pigment Print, 16 × 20 In. Studio Museum in Harlem; Museum purchase with funds provided by Miyoung Lee
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artists/zora-j-murff
This conversation features artist Vladimir Cybil Charlier in conversation about her work Billie Zulie (1997).
Born in Queens, New York, to Haitian parents, Vladimir Cybil Charlier grew up equally between Port-au-Prince and New York. Across several mediums, Vladimir Cybil Charlier employs a visual diasporic language, one that melds symbolic and cultural elements from Black cultures in the United States and Caribbean.
Billie Zulie, 1997. Aluminum, fabric, acrylic, sequins, beads, and hardware, Open: 8 x 13 x 5 in.,
Closed: 8 x 8 1/4 x 3 1/2 in., and Other (Box): 7 3/4 x 13 1/2 x 11 in. Studio Museum in Harlem; gift of the artist
https://www.studiomuseum.org/artists/vladimir-cybil-charlier
Episode 1 of New Additions features artist Tunji Adeniyi-Jones in discussion of his life, practice, and work in the Studio Museum’s collection, "A Flashy Encounter" (2021).
Based in New York and born in London to Nigerian parents, Adeniyi-Jones received his MFA from Yale in 2017 after completing his BFA at Oxford University. Adeniyi-Jones's work is deeply inspired by his Yoruba heritage and carries a distinct artistic style filled with vibrant colors, repeating forms, and characters. As he says, his artistic style is more akin to “cultural addition, combination, and collaboration.” Most recently, Tunji, along with seven other artists, represented Nigeria in the 60th edition of the Venice Biennale in 2024.
"A Flashy Encounter," 2021. Watercolor, ink, and acrylic on paper. 16 1/2 x 11 5/8 in. Studio Museum in Harlem; Museum purchase with funds provided by The Lumpkin-Boccuzzi Family
Introducing the Studio Museum in Harlem’s first podcast: New Additions. This series features intimate conversations with artists whose work has been recently added to the Studio Museum’s permanent collection. Hosted by Studio Museum Senior Curatorial Assistant Habiba Hopson, New Additions brings in artists at a pivotal moment in their career to discuss their path to artmaking, their process in the studio, their dreams and inspirations, how they start each day, and more. Each episode reveals how the artist's work and practice shapes their world and in doing so, shapes ours. Listen in as they dive into a diverse array of subject matter confronting their lives as artists.
