50 SHADES OF BLACK
(from black coffee to high yellow)
African American Sex Symbols & the Complexity of Skin ToneMy latest art piece is fashioned in the style of a book cover. Its title (most certainly) and its subject matter (very loosely) are the result of a creative play on the very popular contemporary novel Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James.
Now that the art/cover is created, it’s time to write the book. This is where you come into play. While this subject could very easily lead to a book written by a sole individual, I am interested in a conversation…in a dialogue. I’d like for that dialogue…those contributions from you to be the basis of the manuscript.
Share with me your responses to this piece. It may be in the form of quick comments, reflections, essays, personal stories, anecdotes, memories of things you heard your mama say about Billy Dee Williams, etc. Over time, I’ll organize, synthesize, group, copy and paste these comments into a document with the goal of ultimately producing a FREE downloadable e-book of your contributions to the topic. It’s a book written on the Internet by Internet users. Just like any other piece of art, it’s open for interpretation.
Who knows how this will go? I don’t. I don’t even know if it has ever been done before. But I am very curious what you have to say…and something tells me other people are too.
Let’s talk.
50 SHADES OF BLACK
(from black coffee to high yellow)
African American Sex Symbols & the Complexity of Skin Tone
Conceived and Designed by Carlton Mackey – Written by You
Feel Free to leave comments below
Or
Email extended comments to:
carltonmackey@carltonmackey.com
carlton.mackey@facebook.com
One of the highlights from my recent trip to Los Angeles was getting to meet my long time online friend and cousin in my head Liz Dwyer aKa Los Angelista. Liz and I have been connected since Katrina or maybe a little after when I stumbled upon her blog and fell in love with her matter of fact/in your face writing style.
–LA Connections: Meeting Los Angelista
And the photos are awesome, if I do say so myself.
Chicago teen Marquise Brown got kicked out of his home after he came out. Now he’s heading to Pomona College.
We here at The Mary Sue are huge fans of the fan trailers that have come out of Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises. Sure, there are a lot of talented people out there who’ve edited together bits from all three films to create super-trailers but what we really love are the ones where individuals recreate the trailer using something else. For instance, there was a LEGO, stop-motion version of the trailer and not one but two mash-ups with Batman: The Animated Series. Oh, and let’s not forget the epic Lion King mash-up. But here is something I’ve never seen before and never in my life expected to see. It’s the TDKR trailer reenacted by ground up meat in casings. Yes, hot dogs. And it was created by a group called Sausage Party. Then again, I never thought I’d see a hot dog eating Batman either, but that happened. Enjoy Commissioner Gordon’s mustache, Catwoman’s hair, and about twenty other awesome moments. (via Topless Robot)
Is the quest for racial justice for black people in America really so over that we need a new civil rights issue?
© Charles “Teenie” Harris, 1930s-1940s, One Shot Teenie
#1: Two young women eating caramel apples, 1940-1945
#2: A woman outside Kay’s Valet Shoppe, 1938-1945
#3: Boys (possibly from Herron Hill School) playing brass instruments, 1938-1945
#4: A woman poses with a car on Mulford Street in Homewood, 1937In the days of film, especially in a controlled setting, photographers often made redundant shots to make sure they captured what they wanted. Not Charles “Teenie” Harris. A native of Pittsburgh’s Hill District, the city’s cultural center of African-American life, Harris was a semi-pro athlete and a numbers runner before he bought his first camera in the 1930s. He opened a photography studio and specialized in glamour portraits, earning the nickname “One Shot” because he rarely made his subjects sit for a second take. (read more)
Nearly 80 years later, a retrospective of the photographer’s work, “Teenie Harris, Photographer: An American Story” is on view at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh until April 7, 2012.
Class and style—we still have it like this, right?
Via Sweet Blackberry
The Real Rydaz, Los Angeles’ only lowrider bike club has the flyest bikes in the city AND they give back to the community.
