Titus Kaphar: Can art amend history?
Titus Kaphar: Sanat, tarihi ıslah edebilir mi?
Titus Kaphar's artworks interact with the history of art by appropriating its styles and mediums. Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
to the Natural History Museum?
is I take my kids to the museum.
to the Natural History Museum.
Doğa Tarihi Müzesine götürdüm.
Sabian and Dabith.
ve Dabith ile beraberdim.
entrance of the museum,
of Teddy Roosevelt out there.
muhteşem heykeli duruyordu.
with one hand on the horse,
yiğit, güçlü ve kolları sıyrılmış
but it kind of feels like it.
ama öyle hatırlıyorum sanki.
is a Native American walking.
is an African-American walking.
bir Siyah Amerikalı yürüyor.
to try to explain that,
o kadar çok tarihi bilgi var ki
I try to do with them anyways.
anlatmaya çabalıyorum.
would have never really asked.
sormayacağım bir soruydu.
of such an amazing institution."
önünde nasıl yer buluyor?'' du.
to amend our public sculptures,
ıslah edebileceğimiz
when I was born.
with his own things
is because of a woman.
bir kadın yüzünden oldu.
fantastic, beautiful, smart woman,
muazzam, harika, güzel
about your future."
"I'm thinking about my future now."
''Bak, geleceğimi düşünüyorum artık.''
to the junior college
to what I was registering to.
pek dikkat etmemişim.
about art history.
hiçbir şey bilmiyordum.
when I went into that class.
gerçekten muazzam bir şey oldu.
and say, "Who's that?"
''Bu kimin eseri?'' diyordu.
Clearly that is Van Gogh.
Van Gogh olduğu apaçık.
I wasn't a great student. OK?
olmadığımı söyleyeyim, olur mu.
(4 üzerinden)
dehşet, dehşet bir şeydi,
that I was able to learn things visually
görsel olarak öğrenebildiğimi
this became my tactic
her şeyi anlayabilmek
Things were going well.
her şey iyi gidiyordu.
devam etmeye karar verdim.
these art history classes.
I will not forget, I will never forget.
asla ama asla unutmayacağım.
art history classes.
inceleme derslerinden biriydi.
survey art history classes,
dersini alan var mı,
tek bir döneme sığdırarak
the entire history of art
and Jackson Pollock
but they try anyway.
was about a 14-page section
14 sayfalık kısmı
of black people in painting
ve ressam siyahlar
let's just put it that way.
the other classes that I had,
to go over that particular chapter,
şu açıklamasını duyunca
to go through it."
hold on, professor, professor.
profesör, profesör,
important chapter to me.
benim için gerçekten önemli.
I'm sorry, I'm sorry,
that this is significant.
önemli olduğunu düşünmüş.
gerçekten özür dilerim.
because we need to talk."
çünkü konuşmamız lazım.''
out of her office.
"I can't force her to teach anything."
bir şey öğretmeye zorlayamam.''
if I wanted to understand this history,
tarihi anlamak istiyorsam,
of those folks who had to walk,
yerini anlamak istiyorsam,
to have to figure that out myself.
yapmak zorunda kalacaktım.
and looking at images like this.
resimlere bakarak öğrendim.
some slight differences in the painting.
that I had been absorbing
that painting is a language.
fark etmeme yardımcı oldu.
in the composition here.
olmasının bir sebebi var.
this gold necklace here.
göstermesinde bir sebep var.
about the economic status
ekonomik durumları hakkında
of the compositional structure,
that they have quite a bit of money.
olduklarını anlatmalı.
this other character here.
in research on these kinds of paintings,
hakkında araştırma yaptığımda,
in this painting --
than I can about this character here,
çok daha fazla şey bulabilirim,
just put inside of this paint
içerisine karıştırdığım yağ,
of sculptures at museums?
müzelerdeki etkileri nelerdir?
of these kinds of paintings
of themselves all the time?
gösterilmesinden nasıl etkileniyorlar?
odaklamak gerekenler, hatırladınız mı?
you actually had to focus. Right?
a little to the right,
in the background would come out.
diğer kişiler öne çıkar.
the struggles of our past
ele alan ve günümüzün
and the advances of our present.
heykeller yapmak istiyorum.
and getting rid of stuff.
kurtulamayayız.
do it in the same way
a law in the American Constitution,
bir yasa olduğunda,
but this is where we are right now."
understand a little bit
bize biraz
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Titus Kaphar - ArtistTitus Kaphar's artworks interact with the history of art by appropriating its styles and mediums.
Why you should listen
As Titus Kaphar says of his work: "I’ve always been fascinated by history: art history, American history, world history, individual history -- how history is written, recorded, distorted, exploited, reimagined and understood. In my work I explore the materiality of reconstructive history. I paint and I sculpt, often borrowing from the historical canon, and then alter the work in some way. I cut, crumple, shroud, shred, stitch, tar, twist, bind, erase, break, tear and turn the paintings and sculptures I create, reconfiguring them into works that nod to hidden narratives and begin to reveal unspoken truths about the nature of history."
Kaphar is founder/CEO of the NXTHVN, a multidisciplinary arts incubator that's being built to train professional artists and to further establish New Haven's growing creative community. His latest works are an investigation into the highest and lowest forms of recording history. From monuments to mug shots, this body of work exhibited at Jack Shainman gallery December-January 2017 seeks to collapse the line of American history to inhabit a fixed point in the present. Historical portraiture, mug shots, and YouTube stills challenge viewers to consider how we document the past, and what we have erased. Rather than explore guilt or innocence, Kaphar engages the narratives of individuals and how we as a society manage and define them over time. As a whole, this exhibition explores the power of rewritten histories to question the presumption of innocence and the mythology of the heroic.
Titus Kaphar | Speaker | TED.com