Tube Factory artspace will host an exhibit by artist Carl Pope centering on Indianapolis-based writer Mari Evans. One of the founders of the Black Arts Movement and longtime Indianapolis resident, Evans published her first work Where Is All the Music in 1968 followed by I Am a Black Woman in 1970. During this time, she also worked as a producer, writer, and director of The Black Experience (1968-1973) — a history documentary that aired on prime time in Indianapolis.

The “Mari Evans” exhibit, located in the main Tube Factory gallery space, is a co-curatorial project between Mari Evans, Carl Pope and Shauta Marsh. It consists of a commissioned installation piece by artist Carl Pope related to Evans’s photos, poetry and book of essays, Clarity as Concept: A Poet’s Perspective.

“I referenced the literary theories of Gerard Genette and the insights of scholar Valentine Cunningham to envision “Clarity as Concept” as an Open Book whose narrative extend into the intertextuality of the astral and the casual aspects of the mind; the atomic, ethereal realm where previous reading, feelings and experience fosters transformation which determines the birth of unrecognized forms in the physical,” says Pope. “The text installation “A Reading of Mari Evans’ Book Clarity as Concept: A Poet’s Perspective” and my ongoing meditation about it operate as a single work of visual art and alchemical literature…an active agent in psychic fusion and the evolution of cultural forms.”

Pope wrote an essay about Evans’s impact on his work and life, click on this sentence to read it.

About Carl Pope: Carl Pope’s artistic practice is committed to the idea of art as a catalyst for individual and collective transformation(s). His multi-media installations were exhibited at prestigious venues including: The Museum of Modern Art and The Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago; receiving generous support from The Guggenheim Foundation, The Lilly Endowment, The National Endowment for the Arts, and The Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation. The installations gained national and international exposure with “New Photography 6” at the Museum of Modern Art and “Black Male” at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Since 1990, Pope’s methodology with public art evolved into ongoing collaborative efforts with artists and communities…producing large-scale public art inventions that stimulate public dialogue and/or community revitalization. Excursions into his internal landscape produced the video/text installation “Palimpsest” commissioned by the Wadsworth Atheneum; with funds from The Warhol and Lannan Foundations, was included in the Whitney Biennial 2000. The essay of letterpress posters: “The Bad Air Smelled of Roses” and his recent billboard campaigns continue his ongoing exploration into public and inner space.

“Carl Pope’s work is at once a form of geography, re-imagining and imaging the forgotten histories, people and places in America, and a new psychology, creating a state of mind capable of sustaining the shocks of the present. It’s soul food for the mind, in sharp contrast to the quick hit of consumer pleasure that dominates the art market, and it’s all the more important for that.”–Nicholas Mirzoeff, Professor of Media, Culture, and Communications, NYU

Image: A Reading of Mari Evans’ Book, Clarity as Concept: A Poet’s Perspective, Carl Pope, 2016

Made possible by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Alan Mills, Indiana Arts Commission, Eskenazi Health and Sun King Brewery.