Sonya Yong James: LOUD MAGIC

Sonya Yong James’ exhibition LOUD MAGIC [September 6 – October 19, 2019] at Whitespace in Atlanta is a slow-simmering study of potential energy. The collection acts like a spell—works in it aren’t necessarily static. They’re constructed to activate change, and the material decisions act as catalysts to push the potential to the kinetic. LOUD MAGIC is also an investigation of dualities, and the planes on which seemingly opposing forces (life, death, growth, decay) exist together in tension, and in harmony. Its many sculptures and tapestries, which hang from walls and ceilings, paired with an untitled, meditative audio accompaniment made in collaboration with J.D. Walsh, create an immersive space heavy with ritual, memory, and the deepest pits of human emotion.

It’s difficult to say which is more important to James’ work, labor-intensive process or carefully selected materials. The multimedia artworks are constructed largely from materials associated with nature—horsehair, clay, charred pine, roots, cotton, and organic dyes. There are also bones (snake, crow, fox toe), sometimes peeking out between fibers like a secret, or in the case of Piano II, displayed in a tiny jar. Many of these materials hark back to the days of early human survival. They were used for specific, often life-saving reasons, and such (pre)historical symbolism and practical use reinforces a feeling of purpose. James’ meticulous handiwork appears everywhere, from the hundreds of tiny horsehair knots that make up Mortal Coil to the intricate tapestries that weave together wool, mohair, silk, linen, bones, and other materials. These repetitive actions bring to mind ritual, and perhaps a method of processing emotion. The materials, combined with James’ highly visible labor, amplify the third and perhaps most important element of the exhibition: time.

Time makes itself visible in LOUD MAGIC. It is as tangible a material as bone. The works are all dated this year, but some feel as if they could be very, very old. For all of James’ intentional and careful placements—the painstaking woven fibers, the fine threads delicately positioned in roots, a brilliantly placed single hair sticking out of Piano I—there is a feeling of organic, uncontrollable decay. Where there is order in James’ work, there is also the gently accumulating chaos of passing time. This entropy is seen in the hairs and fibers that pile, almost unseen, on the floor beneath the hanging pieces, like hairs found on a pillow that indicate the unapologetic process of aging. It’s seen in the slight fraying of yarn, the splinters of charred wood, and, of course, in the animal bones. The works could have been pulled from an attic, their stories and purpose rendered unknown by the passage of years. However, the work isn’t all about death or deterioration, or the past. It’s also about life, and the tension between inevitable disorder and persistent growth gives the exhibition its energy.

This urgency and duality are perhaps showcased most clearly in the exhibition’s obvious showstopper, I know a song of the colors where I live …. does it know a song of me? In a small gallery space that can sometimes feel crowded, the work is thankfully given an entire wall. I know a song …. is dense and complex technically, as well as in content. The massive tapestry consists of a wealth of materials, including thin horsehairs, thick fiber chains, branches, and black plastic ferns. It looks heavy, weighted down by a mass of grays and blacks that suggest a burnt root structure. It looks dead, it looks alive, like a luscious rot. It is a messy ritual. The title suggests a need for knowing and being known, and inclusion and acknowledgement in an often exclusionary and indifferent world. The growth in this piece occurs literally—for the show’s duration, James returns to the gallery periodically and adds a new element. Surprisingly, she recently added a red-headed parrotfinch (taxidermy by Daniëlle Frenken), disrupting the work’s largely monochromatic palate with a shocking burst of green and red. This addition reinforces the possibility of growth existing in tandem with decay. James reminds us that life and death are not mutually exclusive.

EC Flamming is the Circulation & Editorial Coordinator for Art Papers. She lives in Atlanta. She subscribes to The New Yorker, Film Comment, Playboy, and People.