Parade: Derek Fordjour Family Opening Reception
Opening Night of Derek Fordjour's new show PARADE at The SugarHill ChildrensMuseum of Art & Storytelling. PARADE takes visitors on a journey through the sense-memory of childhood and the process of forging an identity, and reflects back to Fordjour’s own curiosities, observations, and obsessions as a child artist growing up in Memphis, Tennessee. At once playful and poignant, disorienting and propulsive, PARADE encapsulates Fordjour’s life in pursuit of art while engaging and inspiring adults and children alike.
The installation begins with a tunnel, supported by lighted archways and reminiscent of the marquees at an amusement park, which guides visitors into the exhibition space. The compositions on display represent a broad swath of Fordjour’s artistic practice. There are new “works on paper,” Fordjour’s term for his signature and highly textured collages of newsprint, and a procession of vignettes, small sculptures, found objects, interventions, and music, which leads to a non-place entered by stooping through an opening in the back of a closet.
The works on view engage Fordjour’s own past—the wheelchairs and copy machines he played with as a child while visiting his father at his medical practice, minor experiments with flotation
and buoyancy, wheels and ball bearings—all the curiosity, re-purposing, and exploration of childhood.
The exhibition is the culmination of Fordjour’s year-long artist residency at the Museum and was guest curated by No Longer Empty’s Manon Slome.
Derek Fordjour Derek Fordjour was born in Memphis, Tennessee to parents of Ghanaian heritage. His work has appeared in exhibitions at Roberts & Tilton Gallery in Los Angeles, Sotheby's S2 Gallery in New York and Luce Gallery in Turin, Italy. A recipient of the C12 Emerging Artist Award 2017, Derek has been awarded residencies at Sugar Hill Children’s Museum 2016-2017 and the 2017-2018 Sharpe Walentas Studio Program in New York City. His work has been reviewed in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Huffington Post and Brooklyn Rail. His work appears in several collections throughout the US and Europe including JP Morgan Chase collection and Dallas Museum of Art. Derek is a graduate of Morehouse College in Atlanta Georgia, earned a Master’s Degree in Art Education from Harvard University and an MFA in painting at Hunter College.
Read MoreThe installation begins with a tunnel, supported by lighted archways and reminiscent of the marquees at an amusement park, which guides visitors into the exhibition space. The compositions on display represent a broad swath of Fordjour’s artistic practice. There are new “works on paper,” Fordjour’s term for his signature and highly textured collages of newsprint, and a procession of vignettes, small sculptures, found objects, interventions, and music, which leads to a non-place entered by stooping through an opening in the back of a closet.
The works on view engage Fordjour’s own past—the wheelchairs and copy machines he played with as a child while visiting his father at his medical practice, minor experiments with flotation
and buoyancy, wheels and ball bearings—all the curiosity, re-purposing, and exploration of childhood.
The exhibition is the culmination of Fordjour’s year-long artist residency at the Museum and was guest curated by No Longer Empty’s Manon Slome.
Derek Fordjour Derek Fordjour was born in Memphis, Tennessee to parents of Ghanaian heritage. His work has appeared in exhibitions at Roberts & Tilton Gallery in Los Angeles, Sotheby's S2 Gallery in New York and Luce Gallery in Turin, Italy. A recipient of the C12 Emerging Artist Award 2017, Derek has been awarded residencies at Sugar Hill Children’s Museum 2016-2017 and the 2017-2018 Sharpe Walentas Studio Program in New York City. His work has been reviewed in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Huffington Post and Brooklyn Rail. His work appears in several collections throughout the US and Europe including JP Morgan Chase collection and Dallas Museum of Art. Derek is a graduate of Morehouse College in Atlanta Georgia, earned a Master’s Degree in Art Education from Harvard University and an MFA in painting at Hunter College.
