[Narrator 1] "Art Loft" is brought to you by- [Narrator 2] Where there is freedom, there is expression.

The Florida Keys and Key West.

[Narrator 1] The Miami-Dade County Tourist Development Council, the Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs, and the Cultural Affairs Council, the Miami-Dade County Mayor, and the Board of County Commissioners, and the Friends of South Florida PBS.

[Narrator 3] "Art Loft."

It's the pulse of what's happening in our own backyard as well as the taste of the arts across the United States.

In this episode, women in the arts.

Chitra Ganesh, a visual artist dreaming in multiverse, capturing the female experience at Fountainhead Arts.

And we meet Ruth Burotte, "Solo, But Not Alone."

From comic books to Hindu imagery, feminist artist Chitra Ganesh is dreaming in multiverse.

We jump into her latest works in animations at the Frost.

Hi, my name is Chitra Ganesh.

I am a visual artist based in Brooklyn, New York.

This series is called "Multiverse Dreaming."

This is where the title of the show comes from in some form.

They're almost like little fragments of dreams.

I always drew.

I was obsessed with drawing unicorns, and rainbows, and clouds from when I was in kindergarten.

But I think behind everything, it's always actually the human touch, and that's also something that people really respond to.

Even in this day and age of technology and everything that technology can do from 3D printing to AI-generated visual imagery, people are still obsessed with painting.

First comic book I made, I printed on an inkjet printer, and I made 150 copies, and I brought it to comic book stores, and I consigned it there, and I gave it out to friends.

I often feel like how each artist draws a line is almost like a fingerprint.

That idea is really exciting for me still.

The central figure in this work is inspired by a teenage protestor who gained a national visibility during the protests against murder of Freddie Gray in Baltimore.

Her work speaks to so many different audiences.

It's conversant, it's, you know, dreaming in multiverse.

I always think multiverse as a way of conversing with many different audiences.

It's very important for me that my work reaches a broad cross-section of audiences.

I love getting videos sent of children watching my animations.

Images that we see in childhood and the stories of childhood, they function as this really powerful collective memory bank that's imprinted deep within us.

So you can see that there's a lot of visual iconography in my work.

It's hard to know if the figure has ripped her heart out or found that her heart is ripped out.

Behind you is a wonderful mural that I think just draws in our visitors.

It brings you in like the universe, looking up at the sky and the stars.

I'm so exciting to see this mural.

I love how this iridescent paint came out.

It's so great.

I wanted to figure out how to make a mural that was really immersive and that could hold the whole space and that could provide, like, a moment of pause and reflection for the audience.

Something I really appreciate about art, especially handmade art, or art with that kind of touch, is that it invites us to slow down.

Be with your thoughts and be with your responses.

We really haven't had any time to sort of digest.

Things just keep moving forward at a breakneck pace.

[Narrator 3] Fountainhead Arts is celebrating Women's History Month with this intimate look at three artists, their practices, and how their work addresses the female experience.

[Rashayla] I work as an undisciplinary artist, so a lot of the work that I make is thinking about how a medium can question other media.

So I might use performance to question photography, or film to question performance.

And a lot of times the media that I'm working with is intended to ask a question.

I work with materials that are kind of on the line between luxury and utility.

And they are also used for preservation of archives.

And for me, the basis of an archive is the Black feminine social space.

So I think a lot about Black femme aesthetics, and I work with family members and people that I love in order to show the ways that our bodies in space ultimately are the foundation for which we understand value.

[Gisela] My work is a documentation of stories about healing from sexual violence.

I'm documenting the types of knowledges your grandmother would tell you about how to be safe in this world.

I use a lot of found jewelry and people also donate items to the pieces.

So jewelry, clothing, worn objects.

Being Indigenous and thinking about artifacts.

It's beautiful to have a practice to ask people what they wanna be remembered with as kind of like a protective factor in the work.

There's all these layers folks have to interact with before they can even see the person.

There's a mask, there's jewelry, there's audio, there's voice, there's boundaries in the space before you can interact with my work, which is important.

I think safety is such an important part of my work because for me telling my own story as well, it needed to be done in a safe way.

It's a conversation everybody needs to be a part of if there's ever gonna be any change.

[Rachel] I think of myself as a nouveau pictorialist, which is this term that I made up that refers back to this early moment in the beginning of the history of photography where, first of all, women and queer people were behind the camera in an unprecedented way.

But it's a moment where photographs are really constructed in the same way that my images are made.

So costume and materials are used on top of subjects to sort of create these allegorical images.

And I approach my work in the same way.

The female gaze has been central to my work.

I felt really cautious about the idea of photographing women because I was very aware of a long, violent history of the camera and the female body.

And as I've continued to photograph, I've given myself a little bit more like agency and permission to be a responsible practitioner.

But it's always with this very cautious and particular idea of trying to make my subjects monumental.

I think about photographs as monuments, so even if they're representing something nefarious, I still want them to feel important and like themselves and beautiful.

Beauty is important.

[Narrator 3] Graffiti, street style, and Japanese manga are just some of the influences on Ruth Burotte.

This film focuses on the dynamic young artist from Broward and her first individual show in Miami.

Here's Ruth Burotte, "Solo, But Not Alone."

♪ Everything's waiting for me, downtown ♪ With Ruth, it's interesting because we usually look for graphic designers that are sort of more that traditional visual design capabilities that do PowerPoints, and you know, really basic sort of static imagery and things of that nature.

That's obviously in high demand for our clients.

But Ruth is an artist at a whole other level.

But it's not just TikTok.

It can be LinkedIn, Reddit, anything.

She's always inspiring the whole team.

She brings culture to our office.

She lets us know what's cool.

And then when I saw him again, right, they gave him free off white, like, sneakers.

And he wore those things to the ground.

I mean just check out some of this great stuff that she's helped us produce.

And like, this is just a tiny glimpse.

She's certainly excited about her art.

But she's excited and puts this just amazing sort of wholesome energy into all of the work that she does.

And I think that's part of why she's so successful at a young age, and why it's kind of breaking through, because it's almost like people can feel that authenticity in her work.

I am preparing for my first ever solo exhibition that's happening during Art Basel.

I'm right now doing, like, an underpainting.

I'm working on, like, a few extra pieces, adding to the ones I've already done.

It takes a moment for me to try to get in the zone after, like, a long day of working.

'Cause sometimes it can be really hard to, like, try to be creative outside, like, trying to work in your passions after doing work all day.

But like, it just takes some discipline to, like, get into the mindset again.

Sometimes it doesn't always work, but it's, like you know, it's the lifestyle.

Oliver is like a really cool fun uncle.

You tell me how to, like, not to actually go too fast, just go like a, at a mechanical pace and try not to stay in one area.

Make sure you keep your arm moving at all times, and how to, like, actually try to blend the colors.

Always have, like, one overcome pretty much come on top.

[Oliver] What's the first rule of spray paint?

Shake the can.

And then?

Shake it some more.

And then shake it some more.

The project was defined, ultimately, to paint a big building.

And so we set out to develop the imagery that would ultimately become the mural.

I hosted Ruth last summer.

She was here at my studio at SwampSpace.

So he would see me, like, painting and drawing, and he would give, like, two cents and give, like, his ideas of what materials to go in, and how to use something properly.

And we set her up with some canvases, and paints, and things like that.

And then, you know, we got to know each other then.

And then just be on his way and then let me take control.

And then he would come back and give his two cents again, and I will be like, "Yeah, that makes a lot more sense."

I think I learned more than she did.

You know, I'm all over the place, and I'm the first to admit it.

But Ruth was, she was like a rock.

It was great to get, like, an outside perspective on things, especially from someone as professional as him.

But yeah, we did good.

We did real good.

It was, like, a really great mentorship in a way.

I really looked up to him as a mentor.

I did six car-size clouds for a show in Germany.

[Ruth] Oh.

You couldn't walk in here.

It was crazy.

These are leftovers.

How did you make 'em?

Did you like- They're made in India.

Oh.

[Oliver] Ruthie, you want a coffee?

[Ruth] And then I have, like, DJ friends that will, like, you know, they like to party, so.

That's what I want.

And you're doing- These are four paintings.

This is on the wall?

Yeah.

[Oliver] That's like a transfer?

Or you're gonna go right on the wall?

Oh no, those are like the four paintings that I placed there.

So those are like the four artworks that are gonna be on that side.

[Oliver] But is this a painting here?

It is, but it's already done.

Okay.

I just didn't update the pictures.

I don't care.

This is your world.

♪ Oh, I was trying to prove everyday ♪ ♪ Rather break every rule before ♪ Miami Art Week is from 28 to the 5th or something.

But we'll open early for all the locals.

We just, you know, get the opening out the way and have a good time, and then so we can do all the other stuff.

[Ruth] Yeah.

♪ When I saw her, now that's so outta style ♪ We're currently located at the edge of the design district, of the Miami Design District.

The space functions as a center for all the artists in the community.

A lot of the artists in Miami come together, and exhibit together, and have a place where they can do so.

♪ I was trying to prove everyday ♪ ♪ Rather break every rule ♪ Being here at the Miami Art Society, this is pretty much a place where I like to do, like, my large paintings 'cause my place is too small.

And the show's gonna be at SwampSpace, which is across the street.

How does it feel to you to be part of that stable of artists, you know, who are, you know, really have a great street reputation?

It feels like a community.

Comic and everybody?

It is a family.

Yeah.

First time I came across Ruth, I tried to order a T-shirt of hers online.

I thought it was really dope.

And she had sold out of the shirt, which is good.

And then I ran into her at another sneaker event in downtown Miami.

And then I saw her and we got to meet in person.

I showed JP some of Ruth's stuff, and of course the work speaks for itself.

I understanding he had been following her before, and then he went to see her that day, and he posted her doing some sketches and doing some work.

And I saw it right away and I commented on it.

I thought it was really impressive.

Immediately he was like, "Hey, this girl's super talented.

Her works amazing and it speaks for itself."

If I'm not mistaken, I messaged her, if it wasn't that same moment, it must have been the day after.

And I think two or three days afterwards, we had a meeting to kind of go through it.

Because right away I knew that I wanted to exhibit her here.

Right now I'm doing prep work for my paintings.

I'm applying some watercolor grounder since this is, like, a mixed media print I'm doing.

I like anime and I like animation stuff, but she has her own spin on it.

But it's culturally relevant to her and myself.

Things that I'm into, you know, with like sneaker culture and fashion, and just like hip hop culture in general.

And how it's worked is that since I like to use like, a lot of watercolor and gouache, and, like, watered down acrylics.

I put down this grounder to not only, like, recreate and mimic what it's like to paint on, like, watercolor paper or watercolor material, but also it also gives, like, a nice rough texture that kind of, like, gives it, like, a relief feeling.

It's cool how she takes her own spin on it.

'Cause there's other people who do it, but, like, she has her own way of doing it where it's a little bit more fine art where it's like more painterly.

Each character is kind of a world in its own that you have to really digest and slowly take apart each part of the little drawing because it's telling a very, very interesting story.

It's pretty, like, nerve-wracking 'cause for the last couple of weeks I was thinking of, like, what works I can develop to, like, expand my universe and, like, what ways I can actually conceptualize more so people can pretty much understand pretty much, like, the identity I want to get from this.

Like, I want people to see the work and just kind of feel enveloped in, like, the story, and, like, the universe, and the environment.

People want to see it.

They want to see, like, what she's gonna put out.

And people want to collect her stuff.

People like to wear her stuff.

Kind of like a stylist in a way.

You know, like people probably look at her and be like, "Man I want to dress like that," or "I want to wear my stuff like that."

So it's like a full package.

So it's kind of cool to see what she's gonna produce where it's like a space where she gets to walk into and experience Ruth.

David is Ruth's husband.

Been boyfriend and girlfriend from when?

Since high school.

Yeah.

2014.

Yeah, from since high school.

And one day he came over and said, "Mommy, I have a girlfriend."

I was like, "You have a girlfriend?"

Okay, 'cause David's a very quiet person.

He do not socialize.

So when he came over and said he had a girlfriend, it was a big deal for me.

Oh my.

He sent me, like, a special box, where it has, like, a photo of me when I was, like, working in their factories.

[Speaker] It's almost overwhelming how much choice there is here.

[Speaker 2] So I can look at this model and decide what I want it to look like.

And then once you flip it up.

So yeah these are pretty much my most prized possessions.

I only wore them at least once, but I only wore 'em for, like, about 10 minutes.

I wanna just keep it for, like, safekeeping and just, like, as memorabilia.

But this was, like, a rendition where I kind of made it inspired by, like, Miami nightlife.

So I had, like, this "Miami Vice" colorway.

I asked for, like you know, a nice, like, hot pink trace right around the rim of the sole.

I wanted to have, like, this kind of nice reflective blue on, like, the Adidas stripes.

And right on the bottom there's, like, a little, a see-through part where it says, like, 305 on it.

She inspires us, now we're now getting into Jordans.

Me and her wear the same size, so if I buy Jordans, she can wear 'em.

If she buys Jordans, I can wear it.

'Cause we're trying to get on Ruth's level.

Right now, we're like at the bottom.

She inspired us.

I got, like, different fashion books about sneakers.

This was one I got when I went to, like, a bookstore in New York.

These Dunk Lows where it just has, like a, like, a nice fur.

Another big inspiration is this guy, Satoshi Kon.

He made some of my favorite movies.

He made "Perfect Blue," and "Paprika."

And one of my favorite movies of all time, "Tokyo Godfathers."

So like he's, you could tell, like, he just was a fine artist that, like, went towards making anime, 'cause he loved anime so much.

This is, like, one of my recent, recent favorites.

And it's this art book from a work called Dorohedoro.

It's made by a woman named Q Hayashida.

So, like, this is one of my favorite characters.

His name is Shin and he's, you can see him wearing some, like, Dunks.

She has, like, she drew this giant cockroach, and he's, like, rocking Converse.

Ruth is a big inspiration for finding something that you want to do.

Do.

Yeah.

Yes.

She is.

'Cause she's making it work.

Yeah.

She sure is.

There's that wall over there.

[Artist] Yeah.

Ah!

Ah!

[Artist] Ah, I did it!

When Oliver showed me the frame, we just kind of had this idea of, like, maybe we can, like, just make a piece where he, like, cuts out this wood panel for it.

And it'd be just be ready just to plop back on to the back of the frame.

So he kind of had this all ready piece of wood, and he cut it down, shaped it out.

And then it was pretty much ready to go.

So because of that I'm just gonna, like, take advantage of it.

After not using charcoal for so long, I think with the wood it's, like, a nice balance for it.

It's a Baroque kind of style frame.

That's what it reminds me of.

So I think I'd just be cool just to have that... juxtapose it my style.

A lot of the works were coming off of a project I was doing for my BFA, since I graduated this year.

It comes off the story called "Low Resolution," where it's about this girl who lives on a planet where it's basically overstimulated with ads everywhere, and she works a menial low minimum wage job, at, like, this refuel station.

And one day while she's, like, working her shift, these, like, dudes come in, kind of, like, rob the place of the fuel, and make her succumb to an accident where she hits her head.

There's different undertones of capitalism and over consumption, mental health within the communities, and working in a thing that you don't really want to, and just living the life of just bare minimum of it, you know?

So I'm wearing this trench coat that I bought 'cause I like trench coats, and I think they look cool.

I'm wearing this "Cowboy Bebop" shirt because I like anime.

And it kind of goes with the theme, where it's like, you know, space and dystopia.

I'm wearing these super baggy pants 'cause I like to dress super baggy.

And I'm wearing these Air Max Cactus 93s.

They're pretty much one of my favorite Air Maxes.

Look at this one right here.

Yes, sir.

I met Ruth when she applied for one of her public art projects.

♪ Rattle ♪ She was barely 17 at the time, so she became the youngest artist to receive a commission from the county.

What I remember from her is confidence.

She was so confident about her design proposal.

She blew the panel away.

She had a voice.

Some artists spend a lot of time searching to find a voice, but she had had it since the beginning.

I think it's fantastic.

I think it's somewhat of an extension of what she started on in her BFA exhibition.

And just to see it kind of have the space to come through to fruition here.

For me, this is just the beginning.

And I feel like these characters and her ideas have a lot of room to expand.

Yeah, I expected it to be great.

I like the pieces that she did.

You know, there's a lot of different things, all the mediums that she works with, her friends and her digital work.

And it's really great to see it all together.

And she put it together really well with Oliver.

[JP] We've had a fantastic opening night.

We sold a couple pieces already.

It's really good, honestly.

Like, it was such a huge turnout.

More than I expected.

So many people pulled up that I never met before, and they've just been, like, following me up for, like, the past years.

And it's been crazy, honestly.

Like, I'm actually feeling really proud tonight.

I've been getting so much good feedback on the show.

People, like, really vibe with the story.

They were, like, loving it, telling me how much they liked the projection mapping.

And they were all surprised that I kind of like, did the whole thing, that this is all my work.

They didn't expect that.

So now people know I'm, like, do a lot of, like, multimedia stuff, which is cool.

I even talked to a kid who told me he loved the story, which is great feedback for me.

So yeah, it was just, like, 100% a success.

[Narrator 3] Find full episode segments and more at artloftsfl.org, and on YouTube at South Florida PBS.

[Narrator 1] "Art Loft" is brought to you by- [Narrator 2] Where there is freedom, there is expression.

The Florida Keys and Key West.

[Narrator 1] The Miami-Dade County Tourist Development Council, the Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs, and the Cultural Affairs Council, the Miami-Dade County Mayor, and the Board of County Commissioners, and the Friends of South Florida PBS.