Uptown Triennial captivates spectators in an artistic, sonic world

By BRENIKA BANKS Special to the AmNews

Visual arts and sounds make for a perfect match with Uptown Triennial 2023’s summer debut. This artistic tribute to the sonic world opened on June 23 at Columbia University’s Lenfest Center for the Arts, where the exhibit explores dimensions of music, soundscapes, and spoken word honoring Harlem. Director and Chief Curator Betti-Sue Hertz aimed to create an exchange of ideas that transcend any concept of what is possible when visual artists account for the significance of the sonic sphere, according to their site.Underrepresented Black communities propel the exhibit’s audience to learn essential knowledge enriching Harlem’s artistic impact. Multidisciplinary artist and curator Dianne Smith’s collaborative standout piece with Carl Hancock Rux is sure to teach. “Amin Shelah” is a three-channel video installation with a Jerusalem-inspired prayer wall made from brown butcher paper, where visitors are encouraged to leave behind written prayers and good thoughts. Smith, who credits herself as the conceptualizer of the display, describes her combined art with Rux as bringing ideas into fruition aesthetically. “[Carl] and I have worked symbiotically where I’ve been able to bring his vision to life,” said Smith. She contributes visual articulation to Rux’s ideas by incorporating a projector showing moving images amplifying Afro-Judaism. “This is a community that is not talked about enough,” said Smith. Harlem is home to Black Jewish people, and once housed the second largest population of Jews in America—about 175,000, according to religionnews.com. However, data and information about the Afro-Jewish is very difficult to find. “Amin Shelah” is made to transport viewers into an awareness of African-descendant Jewish people that they may have not known about prior. “We are everywhere, the diaspora is everywhere,” said Smith. The main sounds in this display are Hebrew chants and Carl Hancock Rux’s spoken voice over the chants, ending with wellknown Harlem Renaissance singer Paul Robeson singing Jewish songs. This sonic installation enhances significant music, voices, and prayers of the Black Jewish population in Harlem. The significance of music from African Americans hits a monumental point this summer as hiphop celebrates its 50th anniversary. The genre went from rhythmic scratches on turntables locally in the Bronx to becoming a global top-seller. Graffiti art and boomboxes were heavily associated with hip-hop’s beginning stages. Multimedia artist Bayeté Ross Smith’s piece, “HipHop 50 Boombox” is creatively made from sugar cane, cotton, wood and metal as hip-hop music plays from within. He painted the sculpture with the Pan-African color scheme of black, green, and red, along with gold and white. “It plays a soundtrack that’s made up of people’s favorite freedom and liberation songs, as well as accounts from historians about the role of the sugar and cotton industries building the billion-dollar wealth of western economies,” said Ross Smith. The New York City native uses photography, film, and visual journalism to tackle and enhance his exploration of social systems, racial issues, and Black culture. Ross Smith’s talks with Uptown Triennial curators led to his sculpture being featured. His art adds to different cultural experiences and framing of the diaspora as it resonates with Harlem. He cleverly intertwines the magnitude of sugar and cotton with Black culture’s—specifically hip-hop’s—correlation to Black labor. “In both of these cases, you have these billion-dollar economies based on Black labor and Black ingenuity building intergenerational wealth that few Black people, whether they’re Black Americans [or] Afro Latinos, are actually sharing in,” said Ross Smith. His unique perspective brings attention to where wealth is flowing. Most of the time, the money isn’t shared with the Black communities despite their hard work, which in the case of hip-hop has certainly surpassed what its founders could have ever imagined.

“It’s grown to be one of the most profound cultural movements in the history of humanity,” said Ross Smith. Architect and fine-art photographer Ruben Natal-San Miguel has his photograph, “R.E.S.P.E.C.T. (Aretha Franklin, 1942-2018) on display. The Puerto Rican artist enjoys photographing people, yet his pieces for this exhibition, including “Lenox Lounge (Before),” were famous Harlem buildings known for music.

“The great thing about the Apollo is that when [legendary singers] die, they honor [them],” said San Miguel. Lenox Lounge was a well-known jazz club for many years in Harlem.These iconic buildings were fascinating to him and influenced his move to Harlem. “Imagery and places make a lot of people want to move to New York City because of what they see,” San Miguel said, adding that he’s grateful for his images being in a show like this because he “never thought in a billion years” this could be a possibility