.: Behind 10X10

Wednesday, September 03, 2014

Behind 10X10

The 10X10 Project was my first large scale showing in Toronto. Ten LGBT Photographers with the task of photographing 10 LGBT people in the arts. I knew from the moment I got the go from James Fowler the curator and man behind 10X10 that I wanted to approach this opportunity from an informal position. Maybe more guided in spirit by Leibovitz or La Chapelle yet still my own and ultimately guided by the individual being shot.

DJ BlackCat was something I had in the works for sometime and ripe for this moment. BlackCat has been a DJ in the village for more than 20 years and as such he carries the cache of being a pioneer. What better metaphor in the 21st century that that of the pioneer astronaut... Always modern, always moving forward into the future. His life is music therefore his life-support became a boombox reminiscent of earlier times in his career. The crystal ball topped flag naming this place as his territory.... The Baby on skates was a little bad ass and thrown in as an extra touch of kitch which maybe a dying concept but fit into his story.

Marcus Ware Co-Curated the 2014 Church Street Mural Project along with James Fowler. This first mural partially anchors the southern end of Church Street and was one of the first to be completed... Having Marcus elevated in the air came out of the idea of joy and satisfaction at seeing such a large project coming to fruition. How did he get there?

Michael Chambers is widely known photographer in the Community, Canada and beyond. As my primary goal was to show the artist with or doing their work his portrait includes one of his more recent works. Michael also was one of this years 10X10 Photographers.

Working with Kevin is always fun. We had had many conversations about how much and in what ways being Gay influenced his work and in many ways I was surprised when he went with this idea. The flowing flag is not real but emanating from his one hand as if to say this is only one part of who I am... The happy occurrence of the shadow on the ceiling speaks to the duality in all of us.

Anna Camilleri is a writer as well as the creator of public tile and glass mosaics. She created the long path mozaic on the south side of the 519 Community Centre as well as the woman with the red umbrella at church and collage. Her Mozaic's are long term projects... imagine if I created my photos one pixel at a time.... In this image I went for creating a mozaic using photoshop tools, the background was chosen for its intensity and drama... both can be found in her writing!

Phil Edward Villeneuve, A DJ, The Arts Editor for Xtra Magazine and all around dance maven as you can see in one of his many video's. I wanted to capture that abundant energy as well as honor the connection to Church and Wellesley village that he takes on in his everyday in his work.

Rhoma Spencer is the Artistic Director/General Manager at Theatre Archipelago, Actor, Playwright
who's many themes have included work about the underground railroad. In this image I wanted an image of her creating via her thoughts, what one of the scenes would look/feel like.

Abdi Osman, a Documentary Film Artist and long time friend. In this image we chose to use the influence from a Gordon Parks Photograph.

Sheldon Dixon, Singer/Songwriter... This is the only non constructed images as I was fortunate to be able to photograph one of his music videos being filmed!

In Actor Samson Brown's photograph I was able to capture elements of his family back ground as well as capture his current political feelings...

Note: All images and text (not specified) is copyrighted by Christopher Cushman. This site does not specify or denote the sexual orientation of any model and as such please post your comments accordingly.

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The Dance Through Life Project

Photograph project dedicated to capture the Art of Dance within the parameters of everyday life. The project hopes to capture the innate relationships between dance and everyday life. Images of dance performed in non-traditional locales hopefully demystifying dance as being inaccessible and drawing the obvious metaphor that while all can not express life with such movement and physicality, we all love with our own signature grace. Therefore we all dance.

Order your copy today by clicking on the books above!

Through New Eyes: The Photography of Christopher Cushman by Rinaldo Walcott

The Black male body remains an enigma despite its over representation in the public sphere. The dominance of hip hop culture globally, driven in part, but not exclusively by the innovative sounds of rap music have made Black men a standard by which Black men and other men judge themselves in contemporary culture. However, there is a paradox, because despite the prevalence of hip-hop’s popular global impact, Black men are also still some of the most despised men in Western culture. Stereotypes of criminality, disease and danger still abound and organize Black men’s lives, even within hip hop culture. Thus representations of Black men tend to be much more restricted, than open-ended. The struggle to bring Black men into complex open-ended representations has been an on-going historical struggle. One of the most potent forms of representation in the last one hundred and fifty years has been the photograph. Photography has offered the promise to represent the real in a manner that has both seduce its viewers and baffled them with its artifice. Black male photographic representations in the last half of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first have promised to rescue Black men from the confines of mis-representation and stereotype. One of the most difficult and complicated circumstances of Black male representations has been in the realm of representing their sexuality. Black men’s sexuality is still over-burdened by a perceived threat and danger, especially now in the hyped-up era of the downlow. Then along comes Cushman. I first hear of Christopher Cushman’s photography from my boyfriend. He told me of a guy who was taking photographs of black nudes based upon how they wanted themselves to be seen, not how he posed them as his models. When I met Cushman he confirmed that he did indeed work from the models’ suggested posed and not impose his own. The idea is a great one because it allows the models agency in choosing what they believe to be an adequate representation of who they are. While it is now true that in contemporary culture subjects have learned to play for the camera, offering us artifice on command, this artifice can be understood as exposing inner senses of self and being. Cushman’s photography captures and reveals those inner desires. Look at me, many of the models seems to say. But look at me anew, is also what they seem to project and insist on. Cushman’s eye lavishes these Black male bodies with glimmers of light revealing their nuance personalities. While most of the men are naked their individuality comes clearly through. And yet, their eyes too reveal that they belong to a community, a family and possess desires, fantasies and needs. In these photographs, as viewers we are given new eyes to see beyond our inner voyeur. Cushman channels, Robert Mapplethorpe, Rotimi Fani-Kayode and many other artists, commercial and amateur photographers who seek to rescue the Black male body from the disastrous depths of mis-representation, and who almost always fall short. The conversations that his models create between his work and others whether unconscious or not reveal the profound influence of the image in our time. However, in Cushman’s eyes the Black male body is not being rescued, instead it stands on a self-made pedestal, not arrogantly announcing its existence but coolly (its signature) singing its own praisesong as swathes of light and behind the camera love washes over it. In each moment a small but significant revelation is made. Each revelation offers us the opportunity of an Epiphany – to think a thought about a Black man that we have not thought before. Professor Rinaldo Walcott is a cultural critic and Canada Research Chair of Social Justice and Cultural Studies at the University of Toronto. He lives and writes in Toronto.

FIERCE! Being Black, Being Gay in America

"What Chris has done with this important collection of images, Fierce: Being Black, Being Gay in America, A Photographic Essay, is to seek, lift, and affirm the identity and visibility of men-who love-men and express it in many ways. His photographs display Midwest American men from the outlandish and flamboyant, to the subdued and subtle. You’d think these were “ladies who lunch;” muscular men dressed for the “Park” in lace, and floppy hats to give effect for all to see. Brothers connecting in places we know are safe, such as our nightclubs, the discos, and special events targeting our interests.

The importance of Fierce is paramount: all men are created equal, and share a space on earth. These portraits of men have to be recognized as God’s beauty and not His damnation. Time will thank those who were strong and dared enough to express themselves for all to see and appreciate in a manner that’s loving and creative. Time will also thank us for not living in a paranoid state of mind, and afraid of our own shadows. Remember, this cluster of work isn’t Robert Mappelthope’s approach to black imagery, but the approach of documenting men as they wanted to be seen: with and without sexual stimulation, for shock value."

Curtis A. Lipscomb
Executive Director Kick – The Agency for L-G-B-T African-Americans
Detroit Michigan / 2005
www.e-kick.com