Marinda: COMING UP ON KVIE ARTS SHOWCASE... WE CELEBRATE ARTS FROM AROUND THE WORLD AND RIGHT HERE AT HOME.

AN ARTIST WHOSE WORK PRESERVES TRUTH, SHARES CULTURE AND INSPIRES CHANGE Akinsanya: For me, art is life.

It's like air it's like everything you need to survive.

I couldn't survive without it.

Marinda: PHOTOGRAPHIC SLIDE SHOWS Noel: You get the idea of being in a darkened room with the sound of the slide projectors changing.

Marinda: ILLUSIONISTIC CANVASES Robert: I wanna see where I can take and use illusion to make metaphor, to use symbol to relate to different issues.

Marinda: REPRESENTATION THROUGH PAINTING Kelsey: I got to a point where I was like, I can just paint my representation that I want.

It kind of serves as filling gaps in places where I think they need to be filled.

Marinda: IT'’S ALL UP NEXT ON KVIE ARTS SHOWCASE.... ♪♪ ♪♪ Marinda: ARTIST AKINSANYA KAMBON HOPES THROUGH HIS ART TO INSPIRE OTHERS TO SEEK TRUTH AND GAIN THE COURAGE THAT INSPIRES THEM TO SHARE THEIR OWN STORIES.

♪♪ Akinsanya: I like to have people walk through and they're looking.

If there's music playing by a particular piece, you can feel that the drum beat.

And when you look at the work, you feel like you're right there in the painting or in, right in the sculpture, you can, you can kind of connect with the spirit of whatever it is... ♪♪ ...

I think that I would like people to know that I don't look at it as my art.

I look at it as the people's art.

I think that it came through me and I felt like I was just used as a vehicle to create this... you know, when I'm creating.

Uh, I guess people that are around me, they know that I'm in the trance.

I'm not even present mentally.

I'm like in a spiritual place.

And, uh, like the ancestors told me we have been guiding your hands.

So they guide, they guide my hands.

I think art is the most vital thing is something special because you can see it, you can touch it, you can feel it... art is one of most important and one of the best ways of expressing one's culture because, uh, people's culture is like a total of everything that they do.

It's the history, the talk, the dance, the songs, and the way you express all of that, how you tell the story, is you tell the story with the art.

So that people that come after us can look at the art and learn to read it... Marinda: As a former Marine, art professor and member of the Black Panthers, Akinsanya believes that his art preserves the foundation of the past.

And in order to create change for the next generations, we must start by acknowledging the shame of that past.

Akinsanya: And I look at it from that position.

I just can't help it because you know of these things, you know, and you see that this hatred is something that could have been dealt with after the civil war, but it wasn't.

It was something that they, they let all the captive, uh, Confederate soldiers go home after the war, they let them out of prison.

And when they got home.

They had this in their mind that there's a such thing as the superior race.

They didn't do anything to reeducate them.

You know, and make them look at all people as though we are all humans, they still look at us as thou we are inferior and they feel like they have the right to rule us and they see us as a threat.

And that pains me.

So I know that the artwork that I do will be teaching about this struggle long after I'm dead, it will be teaching.

And I'm glad of that.

...when I was in the black Panther party, um, I was the Lieutenant of culture for the Sacramento chapter.

And my responsibility was to interpret everything that came out.

Uh, in a revolutionary way to kind of bring about change...

I think that you should allow young people to ask questions and you can't just give them an answer that you believe you gotta, you gotta kind of find out what the truth is.

Marinda: When you experience the works of Professor Akinsanya Kambon, you learn from, engage with, and are inspired by his art.

With over 4000 works, Akinsanya hopes to instill courage in others to seek truth and share their own stories.

While also ensuring his art is accessible to everyone.

Akinsanya: And I think that I need to try and make it available to young people, to all the youth, black, white, red, yellow, it doesn't matter...

I think that all youth should be exposed to it so they can all learn.

It gives a child hope they can see things.

That, whatever artists did the work, they can see it.

They can look at it.

I mean, I still remember the paintings and the horses and the dogs and all the little things that the artists did and how the paintings were like huge.

And to see all of that as a child, I think it just gave me a world.

It makes you want to live.

It makes you want to do things.

It makes you want to go places.

It makes you want to learn.

And I think that's what kind of started me on a journey.

And I really, uh, have a lot of respect for my wife because she stuck in there through everything I went through and she's responsible for me being alive right now.

You know, so I think that was a spiritual connection too, I believe.

For me, art is life.

It's like air it's like everything you need to survive.

I couldn't survive without it.

Um, I think that, um, I think I was kept alive to do what I'm doing.

I mean, I, I was blown up twice in Vietnam.

I could have been dead either one of those times, I got shrapnel steel coming out of me sometimes, you know.

And, um, I, uh, I think about all the different times I could have lost my life and didn't, and I look at it like it's a blessing from the creator and when he's tired of me doing the work that I'm doing.

He let me come on home to heaven and wherever, or wherever I'm going, you know, so I don't worry about it.

I just, um, I just I'm blessed to be here, you know.

I'm blessed to do the work that I do.

♪♪ ♪♪ Marinda: THE EXHIBITION "“THE NEIGHBORS: SLIDE SHOWS FOR AMERICA"” AT THE UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA'S CONTEMPORARY ART MUSEUM PRESENTS PHOTOGRAPHIC SLIDE SHOWS FROM FIVE DIFFERENT ARTISTS THAT FOCUS ON THE COMMUNITIES THAT HELP COMPRISE AMERICA.

(Slide Projector) Noel: Well, the exhibition is called, "The Neighbors Slideshows for America" It's five commissioned photographic slide shows or photographic portfolios, from five artists who lived and work in America.

♪♪ We invited these five artists to give us a look at their community.

Christian: The idea really is to sort of get a composite view of America at a time when that composite view is being contested seriously, contested both in our electoral process but also in the culture.

So what we wanted to do is to to basically hand off the idea of coming up with that composite view.

To five brilliant photographers.

♪♪ Noel: So each of them gave us they were digital.

So we put these into slide format.

So believe it or not there's still places that will make slides for you.

So you get the idea of being in a darkened room with the sound of the slide projectors changing.

So what sort of brings up that whole nostalgic aura of being in a community , watching slides together in a darkened room.

- So what we wanted to do at the museum with this show was really to appeal to some of that too, to appeal to that community, maybe lost community or community in construction.

- You know, this is a very interesting, shall we say time for our country?

There's a lot of division.

There's a lot of mistrust.

And I think this is a really good time to remind ourselves of who we are and what makes us strong.

And that's really our diversity.

Christen: There is a, a great photo by Kathya Maria Landeros of probably the daughter of a farm worker and remember farm worker Latino holding a sparkler during the 4th of July.

There is a beautiful picture of a young boy dressed in hasidic clothing, overlooking the Brooklyn Queens expressway in Williamsburg America's city.

There is a picture by Kurt Hammelburgof men taking down a flag, and it seems to be draped all over his head with cornfields behind him.

And then there's a lot of photographs of a family.

♪♪ Kathya: Even though I do photograph in my family and in communities that I know, it just feels like people are very vulnerable right now.

♪♪ - I Think I'm just becoming more resourceful and finding ways to continue creating the work that I need to make.

But in a way that truly, you know, feels safe to me right now.

- We have each one of the projections taped, videotaped and available on the website, which is the way viewers will be able to experience the show essentially until we hit phase three and we can allow a limited number of people to walk through.

- But we kind of wanted to hedge our bets, not knowing what's gonna happen.

Could we make it both real and virtual?

The challenges are, it's never going to be the same as walking into a gallery and seeing work firsthand.

And having the experience of being able to actually be in that space.

And you can converse with the works.

You can see one work next to another work and see how the curator has placed them in conversation.

And so it's never gonna be the same as that real life kind of acquaintanceship with the works.

On the other hand, it's always there when you want it.

And the other hand, it makes the work available to them, really broad range of people.

And, you know, an almost unlimited number of viewers.

- We are in apart together mode.

And I think this is one way in which we can arrive at some more of that togetherness and I think that's fundamental.

- Right now what else can you do?

We are planning on always having some kind of virtual element tour exhibitions, even when we're gonna be completely open.

And so I don't think that's ever going to go away.

I think we're just, I think we artists and curator, et cetera.

I think we're just on the threshold of what virtual exhibitions can eventually be.

So it's kind of exciting to think of the landscape that's out there that we can explore.

♪♪ Marinda: MICHIGAN ARTIST AND EDUCATOR ROBERT SCHEFMAN USES ILLUSION TO RENDER AN IMAGE.

IN HIS RECENT SERIES THAT DELVES INTO THE WORLD OF SECRETS.

♪ (soft piano music) ♪ Robert: The most important thing you can do is invest yourself in the work and be willing to take and use what is most appropriate, in terms of the skill, to get your idea across.

Since I was a kid, I always loved art.

But I also liked medicine as well.

So, actually, when I was in high school, I had an internship down at Receiving Hospital doing autopsies.

That experience gave me a different perspective on the human body, about being us.

And eventually, that found its way into my work.

What you see in terms of my paintings and my sculptures is no the way I was trained.

Back in the '70s, you were pretty much discouraged from doing anything that was illusionist like I paint.

You were also discouraged from doing anything with the figure.

But I finally went in that direction and it seemed like endless possibilities, as opposed to a dead end.

So, I went there.

I'm making an illusion, it'’s just a magic trick.

I wanna see where I can take and use illusion to make metaphor, to use symbol to relate to different issues.

The inspiration can come from any place.

You take an idea and you run with it, and you develop it 1,000 different ways and explore wherever it will take you.

If you have the guts to go to places that were quote forbidden, fine.

It's not about starting in any specific way.

So sometimes I might see something that sparks an idea and it goes in my sketchbook.

I might work that and develop an idea.

Then again, it might take five years before that idea, which I see in that sketchbook over and over and over, kinda coalesces with other things that I see.

And suddenly wow, these things go together and they make a different thing than I wanted to say before, but it's unique.

Ideally, what I like to do when working in series, is take an idea and I'm exploring different things that are relative to that.

And trying to explore as many as I can and develop images from them.

So they're all gonna be different.

The series that I'm working on now, which is the Secrets.

So I solicited secrets across the internet.

And people sent me personal secrets.

Everyone's secret is not unique.

In fact, I had very few unique secrets.

By using that secret, not as an illustration of what they sent, but talking about more internal feelings, and developing an image based on that idea.

Some of the secrets were more personal, less political.

Some were more political, less personal.

Some of the secrets were legal issues.

(laughing) But it was enlightening.

The biggest secret that Americans keep right now seems to be suffering from depression, and everything that goes with that.

And so, because of that, it became the largest painting that I was gonna do in the series.

And I wanted to take on that being otherworldly and right in this world at the same time, because that is what we do.

Depression is something you are right in this world, yet you can't take a point of view that keeps you in this world.

There's another painting in the show that is someone who was in love with their best friend and couldn't tell them.

And it was about sexuality, and about choice, and about also the hiding.

And that internal struggle is what I tried to get on the canvas.

And then there was a lot of people who are hiding sexual orientation, drugs and addictions to either food or different drugs and alcohol.

There was lots of, lots of stuff for me to explore.

Some of the people actually wrote again to tell me how cathartic it was, that they've been holding this secret for 45 years and never told anyone.

And that the experience of putting it down and sending it out released them in a way.

The Carbon series started with a trip to the Middle East.

And I was most impressed by this intersection of politics and religion and the carbon.

The carbon was a part of all the decisions.

In religion, dust to dust, ashes to ashes.

Us, as human beings, we are carbon.

In the Middle East, so much of what was going on was not just about religion, but the religions controlling other carbon issues, resource carbon issues, political carbon issues.

And this intersection where all of this was coming together gave me a notion about this carbon series and then a series of paintings called Politics and Religion.

And the two are integrated.

So the Carbon series was drawings and everything I did was made out of carbon, about carbon.

And the paintings were more about the political and the religious aspects of this carbon system.

My paintings are not about paint, it was about what I wanted to say.

You take an idea and you make an image.

And I've been fortunate enough to have moved enough people that they will give me a platform, meaning shows.

Whether it's galleries or museums when you get the work out there, people come and see the work.

I'll get letters back saying, oh, this affected me, that affected me.

I think that's the communication factor.

That's that image transferring information from one person to another.

You're trying to affect someone.

You could go in a closet and make all your work, and burn the closet down.

You fulfilled only half of the issue of the arts.

The arts is communication.

Without the audience, you have not fulfilled all the mission.

♪ (soft piano music) ♪ ♪♪ Marinda: WE VISIT RENO, NEVADA, TO MEET PAINTER KELSEY ROLLING.

IN HER VISUAL WORK, SHE FOCUSES ON REPRESENTATION AND REINTERPRETATION, AND EXPLORES ART HISTORY AND POP CULTURE.

♪♪ ♪♪ My name's Kelsey Rolling.

I'm a painter full-time right now.

I do a lot of work that focuses on intersectional feminism, 'cause of lack of representation.

Basically just figurative works of women of color, I would describe my work as, with varying influences depending on what's going on in my life.

Alberto: Kelsey's a portrait artist, so when we approach portraiture that third wall is completely broken so we get to stare at the subject, spend time with the subject, which is the really impactful thing about portraiture work and the ability that Kelsey is able to have on her audience.

It's just this profound sense of like, who is the subject, how can I get to know them, how can I do a little more research to understand them?

Especially in regards to the pop culture references and the art history references that she has throughout her work.

Kelsey: I get a lot of my ideas from looking at a bunch of things.

I'm really fascinated by how saturated our visual world is, so I look at social media things like Instagram and see cool photos or paintings.

So it starts with getting reference images.

I use mixed media.

I paint with a lot of acrylic paint as base layers and then I use oil paints to do my figures mainly, so I can get really good detail on them.

I'll pick a solid color that I think is really beautiful and just base the whole painting energetically around that.

And that's why I start with the acrylics and then I'll do a rough sketch of the figure, and then I'll paint it in with oils from there.

A lot of what makes something look real is focusing on things that you wouldn't want to include on a face almost, if you're drawing it.

I remember when I was younger, I would draw things and I wouldn't include certain shadows, or certain blemishes, or certain marks under the eyes that really make something look realistic.

So I try to just focus on the little highlights and different colors and shading, 'cause there's just so much variation that goes into a face and skin tones.

I look at a lot of references, but painting as it's seen and not how your brain wants to see it.

I think that's made me expand my idea of beauty in a lot of ways too, which was nice.

I'm just more accepting of a lot of different things, 'cause it all just looks so beautiful to me.

♪♪ ♪♪ Alberto: The type of response that we typically get from Kelsey's work comes from a audience that's more connected with social media.

So we get a little bit, mostly consisting of young people just really vibing her work, really into the subject matter she's pursuing.

Kelsey: I know my art isn't necessarily geared towards a younger audience, but I think having people who look like me or can relate to me and see me as an artist who's just painting people that look something like them would be really nice, 'cause that's what I wanted when I was younger, so I hope to have that for people who need that as well, regardless of how old they are.

I grew up in a different time than it is now.

We all grew up in a time where there wasn't really a lot of places where you'd see black people or brown people in things.

That really influenced me a lot as a kid because I know a lot of other people can relate to wanting to look different or act different.

Growing up, it's hard when you're just like, where am I in these places?

I got to a point where I was like, I can just paint my representation that I want.

It kind of serves as filling gaps in places where I think they need to be filled.

People gain an understanding and can relate to people if they see them.

If you grew up with a bunch of people who looked really different, you don't think that's weird.

If you grow in Reno and there's not a lot of brown people, you don't really know how to interact with them sometimes.

And I experienced that growing up, is just people being confused by my hair or confused about my appearance 'cause they're a biracial couple so they didn't understand.

More exposure to different types of people just creates more tolerance in a way, or accepting in a way, or just normalization at least.

I want people to stop for a moment.

I want it to have enough detail, enough confusion in it that people take a moment to look at it.

I'm intrigued by personal understanding of it, 'cause I think everybody responds to everything differently given their background and given their opinions on art.

I would like them to just like question like where we see people and like how we see them, and like how we interact with them, and like recognize beauty in different forms and different ways.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ Annc: Episodes of KVIE Arts showcase along with other KVIE programs are available to watch online at kvie.org/video.