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 Essay by Halima Taha:

A Sailcloth’s Soul: Danny Simmons

Throughout the history of American modernism there have always been self-taught,  trained, mid-career and emerging artists in the periphery. Their  fertile   ideological intersections have shaped the narrative of  American  visual  culture for centuries. Within this narrative classism and white supremacy coexist as a language understood by its prey, but not comprehended by its perpetrators.  This makes it difficult to explain the social and economic disease of  classism and white supremacy, to those who lack the personal experience of it.  And yet the psychological and genetic effect  of this disease continues to be replicated within the collective activity of artists, dealers, collectors, curators, critics, appraisers and academia.   The art  work of Danny Simmons  engages audiences to  examine the  various mutations of this disease that afflicts identity and community in order to confront the crucial movement toward the ultimate cure--- one humanity for many nations and tribes to know one another.

Currently  inclusion, diversity , equity and access have become critical priorities  for the arts and culture communities in North America.  The changing demographics  require new intellectual voices and cultural sensibilities  at decision making tables. Within corporate arenas, in order to  ensure  profitable quarter summaries, they coined business vernacular like  ‘diversity  and inclusion’ to  shape the spirit of  diversity to  strategically earmark women, Black, Latin X and LGBTQ communities  in global and  transnational markets for their products and services.
 
An essential part of reaching these  audiences, in both  sectors,  is  educating and exposing current decision makers to divergent thought processes that shape broader definitions for  value, identity, community, and participation. But, what does that really mean and look like?  Perhaps the best analogy is described by Dr. Johnetta Cole, Ex Officio President of Spelman College, in which she likens diversity, equity, access and  inclusion to an invitation to a dance.  She states, “ Diversity is when everybody is invited to the dance.  Equity is when there are no special invitations to the dance because everyone gets one.  Access  is  when  everyone comes to the dance and  accommodations are made to ensure their participation.  And, inclusion, is when everybody is  asked to the dance according to the music of their choosing.”

The most consistent  invitation to ‘the dance’ comes from artists.  They represent society’s visual conscience  within the  private vistas of their  intellectual and  cultural aesthetic.  Their statements reflect simple  universal complexities that shape a lifetime of  values, hopes, dreams, challenges and  triumphs.
 
Danny Simmons is hosting  today’s dance for a  global currency in Alone Together at the George Billis Gallery in Chelsea.  He is  an  autodidact  multimedia artist based in Philadelphia.  His  perspective as a painter, printmaker, poet, novelist, producer, community  builder, teacher and  self-proclaimed hippie is ever present in  his work.   Perhaps being a politically astute hippie during the  1960’s can be likened to a Jungian dream cycle in which a rigid dominant culture was unable to contain the demands for  greater  individual freedom. Like his contemporaries through  extreme deviation he was able to break away from the social constraints of previous decades of social norms about clothing, music, drugs, sexuality, education, formalism, flamboyance and social order.

By the 1970’s he witnessed the  reformulation of  ‘otherness’ in the wake of civil rights, Black Power, feminism, gay  liberation, simultaneous  to  Southern black vernacular art receiving  belated  recognition as a major contributor to  American culture.  This intensified his commitment to community development through art, education and social justice.   
 
During the  1980’s  the conservative politics  of President Ronald Reagan held sway as the  Berlin  Wall crumbled, new computer technologies emerged,  Madonna’s ‘Material Girl’ echoed decadence; aids activism began to save lives, MTV shaped pop culture, Hip Hop surfaced and significant collections of African American art increased.  Sampling in music bled into the fine art world in which borrowing, copying and  altering pre-existing  images  and ‘modern art’  were redefined by   neo-conceptualism which embraced photographic appropriation and  neo expressionism in painting,  utilized an expansive range of mixed media techniques.

The  1990’s  was a  fairly calm decade that ushered in the radical  era of  communication through the internet for business and entertainment, popularity of celebrity culture, the emergence of  art biennials and  fairs, including  the National Black Fine Art Show,  the first  fair to feature galleries devoted to presenting Black artists.  Thematically  globalism was the focus  for institutions and artists which  sparked hot debates about race, sexuality and multiculturalism, as evidenced in the  controversial  1993 Whitney  Biennial   curated by  Thelma Golden, John G.  Hanhardt, Lisa Philips and  Elisabeth Sussman.

Many of the issues raised  in the  1993 Whitney Biennial spilled into the first  decade of the  21st century  amplifying the impact of   globalization.  The accelerating  interconnectivity  and communication of information through technology, compressing time and space, provides a multifaceted understanding to  how images  participate in the construction of  identity, gender, class, power, and other social and political values.

Currently, Simmons is  paying attention to   the rethinking of ‘otherness’ during a Trump presidency.  Focusing on specific individuals - black, brown, immigrant and non-Christian people - grappling with  deep-rooted contradictions in social, political and economic  policies, veiled in variations of  violence and institutional apartheid.  This is  contrasted by  art institutions and collectors who are ferociously clambering to fill the historic and  aesthetic  gaps in their American  collections to conceal their abiding history of  ‘black art accession disorder’. They created a legacy that excluded meritorious art produced by American artists of  African descent based on pre-conceived pseudo-scientific definitions, that Black people were incapable of  producing fine art because of the erroneous classification as  sub-human, unintelligent, monkey-like breeders, only good for physical labor to justify slavery in America.

Simmons’s new body of work leads the focus on  the cultural production of self-taught and trained artists without distinction or apology because  of the pressing themes addressing identity, social issues, the environment and Black consciousness.  Throughout the arch of  Simmons epoch  historical references, he continues to ask quintessential and  familiar questions  about human existence:  Who am I?  What is my purpose? How am I related to the world? How is the world related to me? Am I being true to my values? Do politics impact the answer to our humanity? Why do we have to be alone, together?

Danny Simmons paints in a small soundless studio  in contrast to many artists who work with loud music  in larger spaces. It has taken thirty years to  define his vision and hone his aesthetic beyond the artists he has studied.   Time taught him how to  detach himself  from distinct memories and experiences, without amputating  elements of a life well lived. This does not mean that a cacophony of silence is void of the universal impact music has on the human psyche like the folk music of Odetta and Nina Simone, the psychedelic rock of  Jimi Hendrix, the cool jazz of Miles Davis and the urgency from hip hop’s Public Enemy.  Quiet solitude  enables him to embrace self-awareness to  examine the existential core of being human in contemplation of a universal truth. Like Yoda  he becomes one with the internal process of his practice which frees him from distracting strictures of class, race, gender and history. This is the focus of Simmons current body of work- humanity- which for him is born from knowing oneself in order to see others.

Simmons is not a social realist.   Using  abstraction as a mirror like Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of  Dorian Gray,  Simmons  addresses human complexity shaped  by the  mortal ego’s worst attributes of power, materialism, envy and greed.  He uses abstraction to distance himself from literal racial artistic language, as well as, stereotypes about  self-taught black artists.  Like Norman Lewis, his  concern with race and systemic racism is  symbolically juxtaposed  with bold black and white brush strokes.  In Unknown, Simmons’s black, white, beige and red orbs represent the audience as  different tribes  struggling to coexist in one world.

His examination of  inclusion, diversity, equity  and access through shape, line, color  and form begs the answers to: How can we overcome  ego that drives the disease of  “I  am better and more entitled and worthy than you?”  Comparable to  life, viewers  are  embraced and deceived by the allure of  the arresting color in his work to deliberately provoke personal  inquiry about  self and how we  can better navigate, witness, cooperate and change the world….together.

In  Requiem for Headhunter Simmons is searching for his primordial identity and asking the viewer if he/she/they  know their identity.   Not as an American, a believer, a man, a woman, a spouse, a parent, an artist, a sibling, a partner, or a friend.  He is searching for the archetypal parity of being a human being.  The Requiem for  the Headhunter  is “ Use your head to find your true self”, which  resonates with the forty-year-old United Negro  College Fund Scholarship slogan, ‘A Mind is  A Terrible Thing to Waste.  The new slogan is   ‘A Mind is A Terrible  Thing to Waste  but a Wonderful  Thing to Invest in.  Invest in Better Futures.  Requiem for Headhunter is looking for a better future for everyone.

 In How Dare You coexistence can be harmonious, contentious and separate while being  intertwined and parallel.   Simmons is questioning  why we are still struggling with being able to respectfully agree to  disagree?  Why aren’t we treating one another with mutual regard and compassion? He  creates a distinct abstract language of color and  mark making  inspired by his admiration  for Wilfredo Lam, Norman Lewis, Achille Gorky, AFRICOBRA, and  Aboriginal art to express his ideas. 

African art forms  are  particularly relevant to  Simmons’ aesthetic  as part of  an understanding of  self and  empowerment. “The backdrop  of my  work is  African  because all of humanity emanated from Africa.”  In  This Deep Desire, a limited edition quadratych is comprised of four different distinct interchangeable prints. Each manifests  vibrant  abstractions as vivid expressions that create geometric patterns of  primordial imaginations.  

In Secluded Omo, Simmons embraces process-based work in which he treats the canvas  as a textile. He uses bright primary colors and complexity  with  biomorphic forms  that emphasize  lyrical color and personal content.  Like Wilfredo Lam, Simmons  use of  African abstraction in line and form combined with  Aboriginal dots  to provide reference to spiritual  secrets that are always ever present and often  undiscernible to the  naked eye.

Inasmuch as his work is intersected with abstract messages about humanity gleaned from the necessity of  being ‘woke’ in the world, the atmosphere of the  paintings in this show is joyful and energetic.  In Borders his mark making is visibly integrating  bold, thick, smooth shapes and layered splatters.  Simmons’s work presents a  window into the psyche  of humanity by way of  asymmetrical, symmetrical, sometimes lopsided  and  overlapping compositions . The nuance of difference and conflict is an  abstraction in itself,  which  is why addressing the shortcomings of society requires critical  reassessment that exceeds superficial buzz words and band aids. These complementary, contrasting and harmonious iterations of togetherness reflect individual differences,  that when joined together, represent a hopeful and  better future for humanity.
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The George Billis Gallery’s guest curator, Robin King asserts, “Alone Together is about  breaking  down the walls  that society puts around us and the boxes we arrogantly put others in. I want us to  recognize that  in our differences there is strength and within our uniqueness is our commonality.  I am interested in the conversation that builds the world anew, where we  can recognize  and  extol our differences to celebrate and respect them. Danny Simmons work does this.”
 
Halima Taha, Writer, Art & Culture Strategist and Author of  Collecting  African American Art: Works on Paper and Canvas
c tahathinksllc/halimataha 2019
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