10/31/2024 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 10/31/2024 12:00
October 31, 2024
Reza Mirzaei, Visiting Assistant Professor of Art History in Alfred University's School of Art & Design, New York State College of Ceramics, is part of a group show, FREE4ALL, currently at Philadelphia's Mamie & Weaver's Ultra. The exhibit will run through Nov. 7.
FREE4ALL is a dynamic group video exhibition inspired by Art Blakey's 1964 jazz album "FREE FOR ALL," bringing together time-based works by artists of color exploring themes of freedom, power, and spirituality. Taking its name from both the chaotic energy of a 'free-for-all' and the revolutionary spirit of Blakey's album-which included Freddie Hubbard's tribute to the Congress of Racial Equality-the exhibition creates a vital platform where personal and collective narratives of liberation intersect. Through diverse video works, the exhibition positions itself as a contemporary meditation on enduring struggles for equality, offering a space where individual experiences resonate with broader social movements.
Mamie and Weaver's Ultra is a monument to the legacy of Mamie and John Weaver, specializing in the presentation of time-based media, performance, and community engagement in West Philadelphia. It is located in Philadelphia's historic Black Bottom neighborhood, celebrating the sights, sounds, energy, and pageantry of life around the way. The space engages in the preservation of a family's legacy, a community's history, and a neighborhood's radical optimism.