No Bodies: Artists in Conversation Panel at Real Art Ways

No Bodies: Artists in Conversation
Friday, March 29 5:30pm

HARTFORD, CONN. Real Art Ways will host a discussion inspired by the exhibition No Bodies: Clothing as Disruptor. The conversation will include poet Reginald Dwayne Betts, artist Carlos Estévez, sculptor Susan Clinard, designer Neville Wisdom, and curator Alva Greenberg. No Bodies includes a wide variety of artwork that uses language, video, various forms of radically creative sculptures, poetry, and clothing throughout. Within this conversation, a wide variety of topics will be touched upon, including the use of written language within the exhibit, assumptions of materiality, cultural identity, and other elements that can make clothing a "Disruptor." No Bodies: Artists in Conversation will be held at Real Art Ways (56 Arbor St. Hartford), on Friday, March 29th, 2024 at 5:30pm. Admission is free.

The Panel:

Reginald Dwayne Betts is a poet and lawyer. A 2021 MacArthur Fellow, he is also the Founder & CEO of Freedom Reads, a not-for-profit organization that is radically transforming the access to literature in prisons through the installation of Freedom Libraries across the country. Betts is a featured artist in No Bodies: Clothing as Disruptor. For more information, please visit his website.

Carlos Estévez was born and raised in Cuba and moved to Miami in 2004, where he lives and works. He graduated from the University of Arts (ISA) in Havana and solo exhibitions of his work have been presented at the National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana and in solo and group exhibitions around the US and abroad. His work is included in numerous prestigious collections, such as those of the National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana; Museum of Fine Art, Boston; The Ludwig Forum, Aachen, Germany; The Bronx Museum, New York; Perez Art Museum Miami, Florida. Estéves is a featured artist in No Bodies: Clothing as Disruptor. For more information, please visit his website.

Susan Clinard is a contemporary American sculptor. Her life-scale figurative sculptures combine found objects, carved wood elements and ceramic portraiture. Her compositions tell stories, helps us connect and speak to our shared humanity. Susan’s sculptures were recently acquired by the Fenix Museum in Amsterdam, a major new museum inspired by stories of global migration. She is the winner of the National Hammerschalg carving award and the Art by the Northeast award for sculpture. She has been the artist in residence at the Eli Whitney Museum for the past twelve years. Susan has taught at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Palette and Chisel Academy of Fine Arts. She has received substantial public commissions, and her sculptures can be found in many private and public collections worldwide. Clinard is a featured aritst in No Bodies: Clothing as Disruptor. For more information, please visit her website.

Neville Wisdom is the Head Designer and Owner of the Neville Wisdom clothing label based in New Haven, Connecticut. Neville began designing and creating clothing at the age of fifteen, and learned many aspects of the trade from watching a local tailor in his small rural town in Jamaica. Neville has been designing clothing for both men and women for over twenty-five years. In 2008, Neville entered the USA fashion scene opening a tiny boutique in Westville and selling assorted small brand clothing. For more information, please visit their website.

Alva Greenberg (moderator) is a curator based in Connecticut. She started her career as the co-owner and editor of The Gazette, a weekly newspaper in Old Lyme, CT. From 1997-2009, she ran ALVA Gallery, a contemporary art gallery in New London, CT dedicated to promoting mid-career artists working in all disciplines. In 2006, Alva Greenberg was a recipient of the Eugene O’Neill Center’s “25 of Connecticut’s most Uncommon Women” award and in 2018 she received the State of Connecticut Governor’s Patron of the Arts award. Ms. Greenberg currently serves on several boards including the French American Museum Exchange (FRAME), Romare Bearden Foundation and the Connecticut Arts Foundation. Past boards include the Florence Griswold Museum and Arttable. Alva Greenberg is the curator of No Bodies: Clothing as Disruptor.

Photo: Peter Brown

About the Exhibition

The altered and uninhabited clothing in No Bodies takes up three of Real Art Ways' gallery spaces, and disrupts these autonomic responses by playing with perceptions of materiality, cultural identity, relationships, political beliefs, and portraiture itself. Being free of physical human bodies, the works in this exhibition force us to confront assumptions, as well as the ever-growing societal compartmentalization of people and behavior and the social media which increasingly rules our thinking.

Featured artists in this exhibition include Reginald Dwayne Betts, John Boone, Marsha Borden, Rachel Breen, Chris Burden, Patrick Carroll, Susan Clinard, Hannah Conradt, E.V. Day, Lesley Dill, Anindita Dutta, Nina Dwin, Carlos Estévez, Kathryn Frund, Jonathan Herrera Soto, Jesse Krimes, Whitfield Lovell, Adriana Marmorek, Carol Paik, Sidney Russell, Karen Shaw,
Jaune "Quick-to-See Smith", Cindy Tower, Micki Watanabe Spiller,
Cleo Wilkinson, and Cybèle Young.