Cauleen Smith: The Wanda Coleman Songbook | 010 | 52 Walker | EXHIBITION PREVIEW

52 Walker's tenth exhibition, The Wanda Coleman Songbook, featuring the work of Los Angeles-based artist Cauleen Smith. The Wanda Coleman Songbook is an immersive video installation that enlists scent, sight, and sound to explore the multidimensional depth of poems by Wanda Coleman (1946- 2013). Coleman was widely considered the unofficial poet laureate of Los Angeles, and her work guided Smith‘s reacquaintance with the city after a sixteen-year absence. At the heart of The Wanda Coleman Songbook listening room, visitors are invited to drop a needle on the eponymously titled, limited-edition two-color vinyl 12-inch EP with commissioned contributions by Kelsey Lu, Shala Miller, moor mother and Aquiles Navarro, Meshell Ndegeocello, Jeff Parker and Ruby Parker, Alice Smith, and Jamila Woods and Standing on the Corner.
Also called the “LA Blueswoman,” Coleman cultivated her fearless voice through the city‘s myriad cultural and political landscapes, as well as through initiatives like the Studio Watts Workshop and her experiences writing for television, editing, teaching, and performing. Invigorated by Coleman‘s intimacies with and revelations in the city, Smith familiarized herself deeply with the poet‘s oeuvre after returning to Los Angeles in 2017 and considered them alongside her own histories and feelings of rediscovery there. At 52 Walker, Smith not only creates a cinematic environment translating Coleman‘s lyrical and adventurous verse but also a contemporary soundscape that captures the longing, tenderness, fury, and grief of the writer‘s poetry and prose, which so often revealed the unruly and untamed aspects of the major West Coast metropolis.
Cauleen Smith: The Wanda Coleman Songbook is curated by Ebony L. Haynes and presented by 52 Walker. The artist extends a special thanks to Wanda Coleman‘s brother George Evans.
Cauleen Smith: The Wanda Coleman Songbook was on view from January 19 through March 16, 2024 at 52 Walker.
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[@Michael62nyc]

Fantastic installation

[@PaulNelsonSplabman]

This would have made Wanda cry with joy. Thank you.