Don’t You Lie To Me – A Visual Arts Podcast

Hope you’ll give a listen to this interview that the cool guys…Jeff Bell and Warren Hicks…. did for their Visual Arts Podcast “Don’t You Lie To me.” I was lucky enough to be interviewed for episode 12.

Dont You Lie To Me with Susan Harbage Page

Whoa! Stop what you’re doing and listen to this episode!
Jeff talks with the amazing conceptual artist and arts educator Susan Harbage Page. This one is a doozy! Susan is a multi-disciplinary artist exploring immigration, race, gender, and nation, utilizing photography, drawing, painting, video, performance, textiles, and found objects as her media. She’s also a stellar human being that plays a mean saxophone! Susan’s work has been exhibited across the globe and has been collected by major national and international museums. She’s also accumulated numerous awards throughout her career. 

Created By Light: Cameron Art Museum

Peter with Batman Mask, Susan Harbage Page

Created by Light – Photographs from North Carolina Collections

September 16, 2017 – February 11, 2018

Delighted to have an early work from “Peter’s World” in this exhibition opening on Friday eve at the Cameron Museum of Art, Wilmington, NC

Exploring the photography collections of eight North Carolina institutions, the exhibition will examine the evolution of photography highlighting the names of the medium; the connections between the institutions and NC artists working in the medium.
The over 100 works included in the exhibition range from 1887 to 2016 with pioneers of the medium including Ansel Adams, Diane Arbus, Lewis Hine, Robert Maplethorpe, Edward Muybridge, Andres Serrano, Mickalene Thomas, Lorna Simpson and Alfred Stieglitz. Notable NC photographers include Diego Camposeco, Carolyn DeMerritt, Taj Forer, Cathryn Griffin, Titus Brooks Heagins, George Masa, Elizabeth Matheson, John Menapace, Susan Harbage Page and Caroline Vaughan.
Institutions contributing to the exhibition: Ackland Art Museum, Chapel Hill; Asheville Art Museum, Asheville; Cameron Art Museum, Wilmington; Gregg Museum of Art & Design, Raleigh; Greenville Museum of Art, Greenville; Nasher Museum of Art, Durham; Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro; The Mint Museum, Charlotte; North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh.

http://cameronartmuseum.org/index.php?c=current

Dreaming Spello – Spello Fotofest, 2017

Dreaming Spello 
Opens tonight at 6pm as a part of SpelloPhotoFest 2017 : 
La Bella Fotografie in Via Giulia IV Edizione
Mostra allestita, stasera 18:00 inaugurazione. 
Below is my artist statement in both Italian and English
*All the photos are meant to be viewed as pairs. The meaning comes as your eye and mind go back and forth between the two images. The question is how they come together in the viewers mind.
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Dreaming Spello – Susan Harbage Page

Dreaming Spello is an installation of photographs gathered over the last ten years as the internationally known artist Susan Harbage Page made yearly pilgrimages to the town of Spello, which she has been visiting since 1984. The installation takes place in a venue that was once a set of outdoor stairs and at some point in history was turned into a building/home by adding a roof over an outdoor street, a phenomenon of ‘private urbanization’ characteristic of small towns. The viewer enters the space at the top of the stairs and glances down to see an antique wooden desk and chair waiting to be occupied by the viewer so they can dream their own experience of Spello. The artist often works with hand-made textiles, and the color blue (which she sees as protective) and includes these elements in the installation as well.


Dreaming Spelloè un’istallazione che comprende fotografie scattate nel corso degli ultimi dieci anni da Susan Harbage Page, artista di fama internazionale, durante i soggiorni annuali a Spello, città che ha frequentato sin dal 1984.
 L’installazione è stata realizzata all’interno di un locale che in origine era una scalinata esterna e che ad un certo punto è stata trasformata in una abitazione grazie all’aggiunta di una copertura a chiusura di una strada fenomeno di ‘urbanizzazione’ privata caratteristico dei piccoli centri.
 Il visitatore entra in questo spazio trovandosi all’inizio delle antiche scale: lo sguardo cade su uno scrittoio e su una sedia di legno su cui sedersi per sostare e dare spazio alla propria immaginazione, alla propria personale idea di Spello.
 L’artista, per le sue installazioni, utilizza frequentemente tessuti fatti a mano, tracce audio, prediligendo il colore blu (cui attribuisce un valore ‘protettivo’).
 

Natrag Izložba " Ženska krv / Il sangue delle donne" u Galeriji Rigo

“Il Sangue Delle Donne” is now on view in Croatia at Galeriji Rigo.
Here is a link to an article.

The curator Manuela De Leonardis has pulled together an interesting cross-section of work that examines menstruation. I have an embroidered piece in the exhibition.

14 aprile – 13 maggio 2017
Inaugurazione venerdì 14 aprile alle ore 18,30
Galerija Forum
Ul. Nikole Tesle 16, 10000, Zagreb
 
20 maggio- 5 giugno 2017
Inaugurazione sabato 20 maggio alle ore 18,30
Galerija Rigo
Velika Ulica 5 52466 Novigrad Cittanova
 

Il sangue delle donne. Tracce di rosso sul panno bianco, varca i confini nazionali per giungere in Croazia.

IL SANGUE DELLE DONNE
Tracce di rosso sul panno bianco
 a cura di Manuela De Leonardis 
 
Per la prima volta il progetto Il sangue delle donne. Tracce di rosso sul panno bianco, ideato e curato da Manuela De Leonardis, varca i confini nazionali per giungere in Croazia.
 
Grazie alla collaborazione con Karmen Corak, Jerica Ziherl e Antun Maračić una selezione di 24 opere delle artiste Manal AlDowayan, Wafa Bahai, Takoua Ben Mohamed, Tomaso Binga, Rosina Byrne, Rupa Chordia-Samdaria, Sara Ciuffetta, Karmen Corak, Mila Dau, Vlasta Delimar, Isabella Ducrot, Silvia Giambrone, Maïmouna Guerresi, Susan Harbage Page, Sasha Huber, Silvia Levenson, Anja Luithle, Victoria Manganiello, Patrizia Molinari, Yasuko Oki, Sofia Rocchetti, Anna Romanello, Maria Angeles Vila, Ruchika Wason Singh) sarà esposta a Zagabria e Cittanova/Novigrad.
14 aprile – 13 maggio 2017
Inaugurazione venerdì 14 aprile alle ore 18,30
Galerija Forum
Ul. Nikole Tesle 16, 10000, Zagreb
 
20 maggio- 5 giugno 2017
Inaugurazione sabato 20 maggio alle ore 18,30
Galerija Rigo
Velika Ulica 5 52466 Novigrad Cittanova
 
Nel dicembre 2013 la curatrice ha trovato in un mercatino di Roma alcune pezze di lino chiaro (bianco o color avorio), di quelle che in epoche passate venivano ripiegate in strisce verticali e appuntate con una spilla da balia all’interno delle mutande: servivano alle donne per tamponare e assorbire il flusso mestruale. 
 
Il legame concettuale e fisico tra il sangue delle donne e il “pannolino” è strettissimo. Per questo il progetto è stato concepito al femminile con il coinvolgimento di 40 artiste internazionali a cui è stato consegnato un “pannolino”. Ciascuna ha attraversato i diversi aspetti del femminile, alcuni dei quali ancora tabù in occidente come nel resto del mondo: nascita, pubertà, maternità o scelta di non essere madre, menopausa, sessualità, violenza, femminicidio.
 
Le artiste hanno avuto la possibilità di spaziare liberamente, indagando con tecniche e linguaggi diversi gli aspetti emozionali e percettivi del tema, dal punto di vista culturale, storico, sociale e psicologico: 
Yasue Akiyama (Giappone/Italia), Manal AlDowayan (Arabia Saudita), Wafa Bahai (Arabia Saudita), Alessandra Baldoni (Italia), Takoua Ben Mohamed (Tunisia/Italia), Tomaso Binga (Italia), Rita Boini (Italia) (giornalista e scrittrice), Rosina Byrne (Australia), Giovanna Caimmi (Italia), Rupa Chordia-Samdaria (India/Stati Uniti), Sara Ciuffetta (Italia); Karmen Corak (Slovenia/Italia), Mila Dau (Stati Uniti), Vlasta Delimar (Croazia), Kristien De Neve (Belgio), Maria Diana (Italia), Isabella Ducrot (Italia), Silvia Giambrone (Italia), Maïmouna Guerresi (Italia/Senegal), Susan Harbage Page (Stati Uniti), Sasha Huber (Svizzera/Finlandia/Haiti), Hanako Kumazawa (Giappone/Italia), Silvia Levenson (Argentina/Italia)Anja Luithle (Germania), Victoria Manganiello (Stati Uniti), Patrizia Molinari (Italia), Elly Nagaoka (Giappone), Yasuko Oki (Giappone), Sonya Orfalian (Italia/Armenia), Sofia Rocchetti (Italia), Anna Romanello (Italia), Ivana Spinelli (Italia), Laura VdB Facchini (Italia/Olanda), Paola Romoli Venturi (Italia), Virginia Ryan (Australia/Italia), Ketty Tagliatti (Italia), Judy Tuwaletstiwa (Stati Uniti), Maria Angeles Vila (Spagna/Italia), Nicole Voltan (Italia), Ruchika Wason Singh (India).
 
Il progetto espositivo ha visto per la prima parte il coinvolgimento dell’Associazione La Stellina Arte Contemporanea di Roma e della co-curatela di Rossella Alessandrucci, grazie alla quale la mostra ha avuto come sede inaugurale la Casa Internazionale delle Donne a Roma (30 ottobre-13 novembre 2015) con l’esposizione dei lavori di 14 artiste e la pubblicazione di un catalogo in italiano, seguito da una seconda tappa espositiva con i lavori di 30 artiste presso il Teatro Stabile Comunale di Isola del Liri (1-14 maggio 2016), con il patrocino dell’Assessorato alle Pari Opportunità e in collaborazione con Blink Photo School e dell’Arch. Lucia Gabriele. Una selezione di 12 opere è stata esposta nell’ambito della collettiva Intreccio, curata dalla galleria Grefti presso il Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea La Rocca di Umbertide (3-26 marzo 2017).
 
Obiettivo finale sarà la pubblicazione bilingue italiano/inglese di un libro che conterrà: la prefazione di Rossella Alessandrucci, il testo critico di Manuela De Leonardis, l’opera Ciclo di Mirella Bentivoglio, le immagini delle opere delle artiste con i loro testi, un contributo critico di Jerica Ziherl, un testo dell’etnologa esperta in lingua e letteratura giapponese Maria Cristina Gasperini, un testo dello psicanalista junghiano Alberto Massarelli, un testo dello specialista in ginecologia ed ostetricia Stefano Barchiesi.

 

Crossing Over: Embodied Text

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Crossing Over: Embodied Text (2016)
(video below)
Susan Harbage Page
with Katy Clune
Crossing Over: Embodied Text is a small installation, which includes sound. I installed it for the first time in the exhibition “Objects from the Borderlands: The U.S. ­Mexico Anti-Archive,” at Greensboro Project Space presented by the National Folk Festival, Greensboro, North Carolina (2016). It consists of edited audio interviews of two women who crossed the border, a ribbon text made of excerpts from the interviews, and objects important to the women’s stories, which they brought with them across the border. This work is a new way of presenting difficult, intensely personal interviews —the viewer/listener can hold the words in their hands, giving more weight to each sentence, as voices rise and fall against each other. Two Greensboro women who crossed the US-Mexico border illegally shared their journeys and remembered what objects they brought with them.

Migrant’s Lament: Sewing Politics into Geography

I realized I did this installation and performance last summer and posted it before I did it, but never followed up with what actually happened.

Migrant’s Lament: Sewing Politics into Geography, a site-specific installation and performance (30’ by 24’) in the Ex Casserma Monte Rita (military barracks) for the international Biennale Arte Dolomite, is a meditation on the increasing number of border walls throughout the world. Over forty border walls have been constructed in the wake of 9/11 and the Arab Spring. Record numbers of (im)migrants are in movement in the U.S., the E.U., the Middle East, and North Africa, challenging the limits of our global world’s hospitality and compassion. Millions of immigrants are vulnerable, sleeping outside in tents and blankets, experiencing and suffering the lived reality and trauma of decisions made by far-away leaders, thinking about resources and protecting what they already have—instead of people.

(statement continues after images) 

….

In the installation Migrant’s Lament, I literally sew politics into humanity. I sit in the middle of the room on a pink chair and sew a dotted red line into a blue blanket. The action/performance references the millions of individuals that are affected by the construction of nation-state borders. In the installation, topographical maps hang from a red chalk line around the room. The red line, a representation of life, unites all of the maps. The maps depict a region that was once a part of Mexico but now belongs to the U.S. as a result of the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Signed in 1848, the treaty established the Rio Grande as the boundary for Texas, giving the U.S. ownership of California, half of New Mexico, most of Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and parts of Wyoming and Colorado. Mexicans in those areas had the choice to relocate within Mexico or stay within those boundaries and receive American citizenship.
In addition, I added various markings and text on the wall with chalk including words like “appartenere/belonging,” “here,” “there,” and symbols including arrows and a white box, referencing privilege. The entire room is marked with a waist-high red line as a boundary or border marker. I wrote the names of countries who have constructed walls to keep people out above the line, and the country on the other side of the wall below the line, for example: Israel/Palestine and India/Bangladesh. I left chalk on the ground floor of the installation and audience members added to the text and wall markings throughout the exhibition.
In the corner of the room, the viewer finds a carefully folded pile of wool blankets representing our global world and the compassion and care we need to summon in support of individuals at this pivotal moment.
The installation questions borders and their creation with an unfinished rock wall built on a red chalk line drawn on the ground. The viewer remains unclear about this wall. Is it being constructed or deconstructed? It asks the viewer to think deeply about what is happening in our world today.

Ackland Museum of Art

Control, Embroidery on found textile, Susan Harbage Page

Just found out the Ackland Museum of Art in Chapel Hill has my work up in the company of Jennifer Holzer, Guerilla Girls, Helen Frankenthaler, Anna, Gaskell, Kara Elizabeth Walker, and Nan Goldin. Thank you Ackland Art Museum!

http://ackland.org/

Objects from the Borderlands and [Non] Belonging: Susan Harbage Page

If you’re in Flagstaff next Thursday I hope to see you. I will be sharing my work on the U.S.–Mexico Border.

Event Details

April 6
Start Time: 7:30 PM
End Time: 9:00 PM
Location: Liberal Arts (18)
Website: https://events.nau.edu/event/immigration-awareness-series-presents-susan-harbage-page/

“Objects from the Borderlands and [Non] Belonging” – For ten years, artist Susan Harbage Page has made annual pilgrimages to traverse the borderlands between Texas and Mexico from Brownsville/Matamoros to Eagle Pass, Texas in the Rio Grande Valley. As Page walks, she makes photos of the objects people have left behind and archives them, assembling a collection of 867 to date.  This “anti-archive” challenges the historical record and complicates our notion of archival collections and how we create memory. Page’s documentary endeavor also concretizes the borderlands, a contested space that lives large in people’s imaginations on either side.