Presented as part of a2, anonymous gallery’s window initiative on Howard Street, Knuckle Crate (rejected Vitra design) by Dozie Kanu will unfold as a three-month public activation. Over the course of the presentation, the single sculpture will be activated through a rotating program - every two weeks a new record will be added to the crate, gradually building a sonic narrative selected by the artist.
The sequence begins with Skies of America (1972) by Ornette Coleman, followed by Pieces of a Man by Gil Scott-Heron, and Nina Simone Sings the Blues by Nina Simone. The program continues with Voodoo by D'Angelo, culminating in the release of SHIRTLIFTERS, a collaborative album by Kanu and Matt Hilvers (and Caleb Laven). Through this gradual accumulation of records, the sculpture becomes an evolving archive linking historical influence with contemporary production.
Knuckle Crate (rejected Vitra design) questions who has the authority to define cultural symbols. When Kanu first proposed the design to the Swiss furniture company Vitra, it was rejected because its brass knuckle emblem was considered “too bold” for their clientele. For Kanu, however, the symbol was central to the work. Often associated with self-defense and confrontation, the brass knuckle becomes a metaphor for resilience and cultural autonomy. Cultural theorist Stuart Hall described such imagery as “sites of resistance,” - spaces where symbols can be reclaimed and redefined. In Knuckle Crate, Kanu repurposes this stigmatized emblem as a vessel for Black stories and lived experience.
Sculptural and functional, the work is designed to hold vinyl records. This everyday utility echoes Michel de Certeau’s notion of “the practice of everyday life,” in which ordinary objects carry fragments of personal and collective history. The crate becomes a container not only for records, but for the voices and cultural memory embedded within them.
Kanu’s decision to produce the work despite its rejection reflects bell hooks’ concept of “reclamation and radical presence,” - which argued that Black creators must assert control over their representation and resist the pressure to soften or dilute their work to fit expectations. By insisting on the original design, Kanu rejects the notion that symbols must be sanitized to gain acceptance.
The work instead resonates with Hortense Spillers’ idea of “cultural heritage as a site of memory,” and positions the crate as a container for shared histories. Knuckle Crate reflects Kanu’s ongoing practice of reimagining industrial materials and forms as carriers of memory and identity. The work ultimately asks viewers to consider which cultural histories are preserved, who is responsible for safeguarding them, and how objects can serve as repositories for collective experience. Part sculpture, part archive, Kanu’s work stands as a testament to the power of maintaining authorship over one’s narrative, and the importance of protecting the cultural evidence that shapes it
Our first symposium with 6BC Garden (630 E 6th St, NY, NY, 10009) on August 10, 2024, moderated by Lewandowski with David Rimanelli, longtime art critic, and G. B. Jones, Canadian artist, filmmaker, and musician, to discuss the queer legacy of Feature, Inc.'s owner and curator, Hudson, highlighting his unique fixture in the New York art world, and his influence on the present.
A Field of Traces: Rose Salane will join Jorge Otero-Pailos to discuss the role of archiving spatial memories for the collective consciousness.
Moderated by Alejandra Avalos-Guerrero and Guillermo Acosta Navarrete as a continuation of their ongoing research projects
“A Field: To Seed or Not To Seed” and “The Machine is Broken!”
Abbas Zahedi’s new work Waiting With {Sonic Support} will play host to an Open Mic each day of the fair. Located beside the entrance to Frieze in Regent’s Park, Abbas’ structure will be activated by performances between 12-16 October 2022, 3-4:30pm (LONDON) | 10-11:30am (EASTERN)
Frieze named Abbas Zahedi as the winner of the 2022 Frieze Artist Award, realized in partnership with Forma for the fourth consecutive year. Established in 2013, the award provides an emerging artist with the platform to debut an ambitious new commission on the occasion of Frieze London. Previous recipients of the Frieze Artist Award include Himali Singh Soin (2019), Alberta Whittle (2020) and Sung Tieu (2021).
Waiting With {Sonic Support}, 2022, is a prototype for a new form of civic infrastructure; conflating multiple sites: a bus stop - more generally, a public waiting area - a DIY bandstand, and a public support space. Responding to the particularities of Frieze London, Abbas Zahedi’s site-sensitive installation activates the fair’s threshold, to establish a speculative transport system for utopian daydreaming between its inside and outside.
Developed from Jean-Paul Sartre’s notion of bus stops as places to ‘achieve practical and theoretical participation in common being’, one first encounters Waiting With {Sonic Support} whilst approaching Frieze London. Echoing the form of a Central Asian Soviet-Era bus stop, Abbas’ co-designed waiting zone is a site of ensemble; a place where one can depart from the isolated individuality of our contemporary age - Sartre’s ‘plurality of isolations’ - by convening with others in a common interconnected space.
During Frieze London, this temporary structure will serve as a ‘metatopian’ performative environment, that hosts a number of open mic activations. Selected through an open submissions process, these open mics not only extend a gesture of conviviality to other artists and performers but allude to Abbas’ early creative practice as an emcee, spoken-word poet and community organiser. Embracing the legacies of DIY and pirate radio, each of these open-mic ensembles will be broadcast live into the heart of the Frieze London tent. Here, an indoor version of the installation will allow those inside to tune into the active space outside.
Each of the silk and resin works in the exhibition is titled after a song or film. I chose famous American romantic-crime films where the two protagonists are on the run, head over heels, and against the world. My parents used to listen to the songs on the playlist throughout my childhood, when it felt like they were most in love. These songs invoke immense feelings in me and encapsulate the sentiment of the show most accurately. There are certain songs that can make you travel in time, taking you back to a specific emotional memory. Certain songs can simultaneously trigger overwhelming beauty and pain. The word "nostalgia" is formed by a Greek compound, consisting of νόστος (nóstos), meaning "homecoming," a Homeric word, and ἄλγος (álgos), meaning "pain" or "ache." I understand the word to describe the feeling one experiences when a particular core emotional wound is activated, a historic ache that comes from a deep longing to return to a place or moment in time. For me, nostalgia is the trauma of the awareness of the passing of time and its inevitability. Time is a place you can never go home to. Time is something you can never have. I think songs can approximate what once was a personal present. These songs are like photographs to me. I can listen to them and come into contact with a past emotional landscape while concurrently experiencing the loss of it, again and again, on loop.