Artists Reach Out: Monstah Black

Dear friends,

Welcome to Artists Reach Out: reflections in a time of isolation. I dreamed this series of interviews out of grief for my work both as a documenting arts writer and curator of live performance. In this time of social distancing, we are called to responsibly do all we can to safeguard ourselves and our neighbors. It is, literally, a matter of life and death.

But there's no distancing around what we still can share with one another--our experiences, thoughts, wisdom, humor, hearts and spirit. In some ways, there are more opportunities to do so as we pull back from everyday busyness out in the world and have time to honor the call of our inner lives.

So, let me introduce you to some artists I find interesting. I'm glad they're part of our beautiful community, and I'm eager to engage with them again (or for the first time) in years to come.

--Eva Yaa Asantewaa, InfiniteBody

Monstah Black

Monstah Black
(photo: Lia Clay for the 2018 Queer|Art Community Portrait)

Monstah began his career as a performance artist with an emphasis on dance, costume design and music composition. He received an MFA in New Media Arts and Performance from Long Island University. He is currently one half (with his husband) of the electronic duo The Illustrious Blacks. Together they write, produce, record and perform internationally their original music.

Awards include Open Call The Shed NYC recipient, The Tom Murrin Performance Award, Franklin Furnace Fund, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, American Music Center Live Music for Dance and NYSCA.  He has garnered support from New York organizations including Joe’s Pub at The Public Theater, The Field, Movement Research and New York Live Arts. Publications include New York Magazine, Billboard Magazine, Paper Magazine and The New York Times.

Monstah is a Queer Arts Mentorship and Yaddo fellow as well as a Long Island University New Media Art and Performance, MFA.

theillustriousblacks.com


Do you have a current or planned project whose progress is affected by the pandemic?

The Illustriousblacks (Monstah and Manchildblack) have had to readjust and remix most of our plans for projects in 2020. The quarantine has allowed us to take a deeper focus.

A residency project that was a year long at Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning (JCAL) in Queens experienced a complete remix due to COVID-19. Survival mode became re-imagining original ideas and remixing what was in our immediate surroundings. It caused me to reach beyond comfortable boundaries I’d created for myself (sound, visual and movement qualities). This is how our “Walk-in Closet” was born as a venue for Back In The Closet w/ Monstah Black.

It gave me, and continues to give me, a platform in which to share steps in the process as we build on new ideas. For JCAL, it became a direct opportunity as a marketing strategy to promote my film Cotton, screening in June.

Briefly, tell me about how you got involved in the arts and in your particular practice.

When I was a child, my parents encouraged me to practice and study all the things I showed skill in. They’re responsible for dance classes and church choir; most of my creative interests are inspired by them. Other responsible culprits would be Prince, Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Donny Hathaway, Sylvester, Flip Wilson, Lola Falana, Cher and Parliament Funkadelic.

The choice to go to undergrad for Choreography/Performance at Virginia Commonwealth University sealed my destiny for becoming and staying an interdisciplinary artist.

In a more specific way, what are you practicing? And what are you envisioning? 

I am currently practicing bringing attention back to my rib cage and everything below it. For several years now, I’ve built tons of material and improvised structures based on my upper body, arms, fingers, facial expressions and spine articulation. The quarantine is bringing me back to a place of being more grounded, and that, ultimately, is affecting my vocal quality as well as my body.

I’m currently envisioning a life of streaming/film and television. I love performing for the camera.

How does your practice and your visioning align with what you most care about?

I care most about being able to influence and inspire younger generations to love themselves no matter how much they may feel marginalized and been told otherwise. My practice has been to reach beyond the boundaries and limitations that were put before me. I continue to do that in hopes that it inspires others to do the same.

How does your practice function within the world?

My practice (as well as The Illustriousblacks) flourishes in the idea of togetherness and joy. This is most apparent in environments where music, dance and visuals meet harmoniously (dance parties). That’s a language that is fluent in all cultures. Through music, dance and visuals our goal is to spread the idea of love and unity.

Briefly share one self-care tip that has special meaning to you now. 

Morning Movement Meditation and squats. Sorry that’s two lol.

******

DISCLAIMER: In addition to my work on InfiniteBody, I serve as Senior Curatorial Director of Gibney. The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views, strategies or opinions of Gibney.

******

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Urban Bush Women's "Hair Parties" at 92Y Harkness

Madame C. J. Walker (1867-1919)
Hair care entrepreneur, philanthropist and activist
America's first woman millionaire

Urban Bush Women's Hair Parties is a boldly hybrid event integrating excerpts of a developing dance (premiere of Hair & Other Stories coming this spring) with a community-sharing workshop in kitchen table-like settings. I'd imagine each "audience"--surely, that's not the right word here--brings a different energy to it and ultimately determines how well it will work.

After all, the folks who participate are what it's about. Through a variety of activities, they're encouraged to remember and tell stories about things they learned, from childhood on, about beauty and grooming and to contemplate how those seminal influences affect their attitudes towards themselves and others today. It's very much about--as one of the dancer/facilitators noted--"practices that allow us to stay inside our greatness" and those that drag us far from it.

Oh, you surely know UBW, the lifework of the great, beloved Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, is a Black troupe, right? But while Hair Parties must be a blast in an all-Black gathering, its meditations on race can be useful for anyone from any culture--as was evident yesterday afternoon at 92Y's Harkness Dance Center where the presenters embraced a multicultural gathering.

Somebody here thinks they came for a show!

We're going on a journey!

A journey it was, indeed--starting with the sight of dancer Samantha Speis arranging, thoughtfully gazing upon and slightly rearranging a collection of hair care products, almost as if they were chess pieces. For me, this brief, subtle moment was amusing, a subtlety anyone caring for Black people's hair in the "natural" way will recognize. We know how much time and money we put into experimenting to get just the right products used in the right combination or sequence for the particular texture and willfulness of our hair. Tell me that's not choreography!

Dancers invited us to come together around certain agreements on how to work as a community--such as "speaking from the I"--and gave us gestural movements to anchor each agreement, in a fun way, in our bodies. We watched a dance segment depicting a Black woman suffering "hair hell" in an elevator populated first by a group of mocking Black people and then by white people whose very different attention to her hair freaked her out just as much or even more. We learned a tiny bit about the Black hair care entrepreneur Madame C. J. Walker (1867-1919), who went from being the child of enslaved parents to being the first American woman to make a million. From table to table, we performed a shared reading of lines from a letter Zollar addressed to this fascinating pioneer. And we moved with the dancers.

The party kicked up memories for many of us. I was stunned when I suddenly recalled the Breck Girl shampoo ads of the 1960s and later bonded with a white woman over these memories. These ubiquitous magazine ads were in my face--all of our faces--at a time when it would have been more useful for me to be learning about Madame Walker. Do you remember them, too?

As I left 92Y, I actually had a pleasant elevator moment when the same woman who remembered those darn Breck girls told me she'd come to the Hair Parties event terribly drained and tired and came away feeling exhilarated. This, I think, is pretty much the hallmark of an Urban Bush Woman event, and I'm glad she got that healing.

Conceived and choreographed by Chanon Judson and Samantha Speis in collaboration with the company--Du'Bois A'Keen, Chanon Judson, Courtney J. Cook, Jaimé Dzandu, Rochelle Jamila, Samantha Speis and Tendayi Kuumba

Music composed by The Illustrious Blacks (Manchildblack and Monstah Black)

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