Film Series by Glenn Ligon: SOUL! Nikki Giovanni & James Baldwin ‘A Convers

On the occasion of ‘Glenn Ligon. Late at night, early in the morning, at noon,’ an exhibition of new works on paper by artist Glenn Ligon, we're thrilled to present ‘Take This Hammer’ a film series on the legendary novelist and activist James Baldwin, selected by Glenn Ligon.
The films included in the series span a decade from the early 1960s to the early 1970s and range in content from the iconic James Baldwin debate with conservative writer and political commentator William F. Buckley, to a tour through San Francisco to discover ‘the real situation’ happening in the city, to a poetic film capturing intimate footage of Baldwin living in Istanbul, Turkey.
The series will take place in the amphitheater at our 18th Street location in Chelsea.
All screenings are free and open to the public; however, due to limited space, reservations are required.
Saturday 7 February, 2 pm
SOUL! Nikki Giovanni & James Baldwin ‘A Conversation’ (1971), Directed by Tony Palmer
1 hr 57 min
About ‘Glenn Ligon. Late at night, early in the morning, at noon’
‘Late at night, early in the morning, at noon’ is a two-part exhibition of new and historic works on paper by Glenn Ligon. This presentation extends the artist’s longstanding engagement with language and abstraction through a series of richly layered compositions that meditate on the color blue and its emotional, historical and cultural inflections. In dialogue with the writings of James Baldwin, Ligon’s latest work here traverses the space between legibility and sensation, where text dissolves into atmosphere and meaning into light.
About Glenn Ligon
Glenn Ligon (b. 1960) is an artist living and working in New York. Throughout his career, Ligon has pursued an incisive exploration of American history, literature, and society across bodies of work that build critically on the legacies of modern painting and conceptual art. He earned his BA from Wesleyan University (1982) and attended the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program (1985). In 2011, the Whitney Museum of American Art held a mid-career retrospective, ‘Glenn Ligon: AMERICA,’ organized by Scott Rothkopf, that traveled nationally. Important solo exhibitions include ‘Post-Noir,’ Carre d’Art, Nîmes (2022); ‘Glenn Ligon: Call and Response,’ Camden Arts Centre, London, UK (2014); and ‘Glenn Ligon – Some Changes,’ The Power Plant Center for Contemporary Art, Toronto, Canada and then traveled internationally (2005). Select curatorial projects include ‘Grief and Grievance,’ New Museum, New York NY (2021); ‘Blue Black,’ Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis MO (2017); and ‘Glenn Ligon: Encounters and Collisions,’ Nottingham Contemporary and Tate Liverpool, UK (2015). Ligon’s work has been shown in major international exhibitions, including the Venice Biennale (2015, 1997), Berlin Biennial (2014), Istanbul Biennial (2019, 2011) and Documenta XI (2002).

Image: Film still: 'Outtakes from James Baldwin. From Another Place’ (1973) directed by Sedat Pakay

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