Work-in-Progress: Tommye Blount
“Fantasia for the Man in Blue,” my debut full-length collection of poems—available now from Four Way Books—introduces my curiosity about the exchange of agency between subject and observer; performer and audience. Although the book is out in the world, I am still thinking about the power and terror of presentation. Unbeknownst to its gatekeepers, or perhaps they have known all along, fashion is a racially charged and very political art. 24 years after the Daughters of the American Revolution refused to let Marian Anderson, the renown Black opera singer, perform at Constitution Hall, fashion photographer Richard Avedon captured them in a candid photograph. “The Generals of the Daughters of the American Revolution, 1963,” titled after Avedon’s famous photograph, is an ekphrasis—a poem seeking to describe, but is also in conversation with, a piece of visual art.
In response to social isolation guidelines, Kresge Arts in Detroit asked Kresge Artist Fellows and Gilda Award recipients to give us a glimpse into their current and recent projects. Participating artists received stipends of $150, a quick response pivot of resources that could be implemented by the program as an immediate - albeit small level - of support to Detroit area artists.