salvaged building material, digital print mounted on diabondHeidi
Description
Human-crafted. AI-refined.
Akeem Smith's "John Crow 2" employs a rustic palette of yellows and browns within an assemblage of weathered wooden frames and panels. The print includes a striking portrait of a man, whose gaze peers out from the structure, conveying a strong emotional presence. The artwork embodies a bricolage style, utilizing found materials to evoke a sense of urban decay and cultural history. Reflecting Smith's exploration of black culture and social narratives, this piece juxtaposes personal identity with the ephemeral nature of street commerce and community resilience. ...
Akeem Smith is a multidisciplinary artist and stylist, known for his influential and often under-the-radar collaborations using the discipline of styling to create symbolic messages from industrial objects (clothes) through a process of selection. His work is based around social studies, female agency, connecting current events to history, voyeurism of subcultures, examining the undistinguishable nuances/traits of black culture. Smith’s practice draws on the materials found in the urban realm and relates to the street’s significance as a site of both culture and commerce. The patina of the bricolage expresses a certain melancholy, enhanced by the artist’s archival impulse. While art, fashion, music, dance, and popular movements grew out of the shared realm of the street, this familiar spatial condition is gradually being replaced by the virtual. Cultural codes are leaving the physical site of the streetscape. Posters as loud public signifiers are succeeded by solitary screens, an aspect that reinforces the empathy and care with which Smith’s architectural ready-mades refer to improvised marketplaces. Within this ambiguity, the exhibition "Black Queen" Volume 1 transforms the gallery designed by the artist Heimo Zobernig into a hybrid setting, shifting between a theatrical experience against a marketplace backdrop, a club, or an unexpected, perhaps museological showcase, a kind of room-encompassing vitrine. ...
Heidi was established in 2021 in Berlin. It intends to engage with the current narratives in contemporary art and culture, championing artists with strong aesthetic and inquiring sensibilities. It encourages intergenerational dialogue through an international programme that includes both emergent and more established practices. The gallery showcases artists who work across a range of media—be it painting, sculpture, photography, film, sound, performance, and installation-based work.
The gallery has exhibited artists such as Leidy Churchman, Hanne Darboven, David Douard, Mimosa Echard, Iza Genzken, Rochelle Goldberg, Anthea Hamilton, Brook Hsu, Birney Imes, Joan Jonas, Atiéna R. Kilfa, Veit Laurent Kurz, Benjamin Lallier, Matthew Langan-Peck, Victor Man, Adam Martin, Kunizo Matsumoto, Frida Orupabo, Laura Owens, Rose Salane, Jim Shaw, Steven Shearer, Will Sheldon, Avery Singer, Akeem Smith, Michael E. Smith, Jordan Strafer, Sturtevant, Alina Szapocznikow, Alicja Wahl, Royce Weatherly, Marnie Weber, and Kandis Williams. ...
