{"id":9876,"date":"2022-04-13T14:00:38","date_gmt":"2022-04-13T18:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eportfolios.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/?p=9876"},"modified":"2026-02-06T14:45:36","modified_gmt":"2026-02-06T19:45:36","slug":"hunter-colleges-new-art-exhibit-presents-viewers-with-an-alternative-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/2022\/04\/13\/hunter-colleges-new-art-exhibit-presents-viewers-with-an-alternative-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"Hunter College\u2019s New Art Exhibit Presents Viewers With an \u201cAlternative Practice\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

At Hunter College\u2019s Leubsdorf Gallery, The Black Index celebrates Black art and history, seeking to change the way Blackness is viewed in the art world and beyond. <\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

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How is Black identity understood and constructed? What is the significance of self-representation and containment? How does art upend notions of convention and truth? <\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cThe Black Index\u201d is a traveling group exhibition of six artists who explore these questions in their body of work. Curated by Bridget R. Cooks, it was displayed at the Bertha and Karl Leubsdorf Art Gallery at Hunter College from Feb. 1, 2022 through April 3, 2022. The exhibition\u2019s press release states that these artists offer an \u201c<\/span>alternative practice\u2014a Black Index<\/span><\/a>\u201d meant to challenge viewers\u2019 conceptions of the dynamic between classification, objectivity and information.<\/span><\/p>\n

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All the works on display use portraiture or the figure as a means to \u201ctransform the recorded image.\u201d Some of the representations are more abstract, including Dennis Delgado\u2019s ongoing series \u201c<\/span>The Dark Database<\/span><\/a>.\u201d \u201cThe Dark Database\u201d<\/span> is a collection of composite facial scans of characters in important works of Black cinema, such as Spike Lee\u2019s 1989<\/span> \u201c<\/span><\/i>Do the Right Thing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Dennis Delgado, \u201cTraining Day\u201d from \u201cThe Dark Database\u201d, 2020-ongoing. Tagged image format file Photo credit Bridget Li<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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The scans are created by using a facial recognition algorithm and stacked using a portrait template. The resulting image is extremely blurry, almost unsettling to view and barely recognizable as a face, let alone an individual. The portraits are displayed on iPads and the lack of individuality of each portrait shows the limitations of artificial intelligence and other data collection methods when dealing with people of color. <\/span><\/p>\n

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According to Delgado\u2019s website, the series is a \u201crecord of invisibility\u201d using the lens of artificial intelligence, bringing to question the reliability of what viewers perceive to be \u201ctruth.\u201d \u201cThe Dark Database\u201d is one of the first works displayed when entering the exhibit from within the college, opening with a powerful reimagining of portraiture and the intersection of technology and racism.  <\/span><\/p>\n

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Artist Kenyatta A.C. Hinkle\u2019s series, \u201c<\/span>The Evanesced: The Untouchables<\/span><\/a>\u201d, also uses abstract representations of the figure in what she calls \u201cunportraits,\u201d meant to represent the \u201cspirits\u201d of the women she portrays, rather than mimetic images of their likeness. <\/span><\/p>\n

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