Cauleen Smith: Give It or Leave It

https://icaphila.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Unknown-1396x2000.jpeg book cover
Designer
Kimberly Varella, Content Object
Publisher
Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania
Authors
Anthony Elms, Rhea Anastas, Rodney McMillian, & Cauleen Smith
Dimensions
6.5 x 9 inches
ISBN
978­0­88454­146­2
Pages
81
Year
2019
Notice
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About
Through films, objects, and installation, Give It or Leave It offers an emotional axis by which to navigate four distinct universes: Alice Coltrane and her ashram, a 1966 photo shoot by Bill Ray at Simon Rodia’s Watts Towers, Noah Purifoy and his desert assemblages, and black spiritualist Rebecca Cox Jackson and her Shaker community. These locations, while not technically utopian societies, embody sites of historical speculation and radical generosity between artist and community. In reimagining a future through this mix, Smith casts a world that is black, feminist, spiritual, and unabashedly alive.