Blues Roots Instruments and Sculpture Art Show
entitled:
"Sounds I See, Sounds I Feel"
This piece is entitled "Blues Passport"
For Immediate Release:
Sounds I See, Sounds I Feel Art Exhibit:
Newbury Park.CA – Soundscape artist and musician, Charles “Wsir” Johnson, has now created a exhibition entitled, “Sounds I See, Sounds I Feel” . “Sounds I See, Sounds I Feel” exhibit ws first shown at the Rhythm and Blues Gallery at Hayti Cultural Center in Durham 2008. Now available for Gallery exhibits.
The exhibit highlights more than of 24 of his handbuilt African and African-American instruments and sculpture that reflect the unflagging durability and resilience of the African-American heritage. The exhibit focuses upon the instruments' inherent beauty and functional design and, in addition, retell the African/African-American experience in the Americas.
One highlight of the exhibition is an early African guitar called the “Akonting”, a three string African guitar which many has now considered one of the most direct descendant of the modern day Banjo. Next to it sits the transformation instrument called the banjar, the pre-banjo only people of African descent play for the first 100 years.
Displaying African instruments alongside their American adaptations reveals construction, use, and musical style. The story of African-American musical instruments and scupture touches upon issues of cultural transformation, identity, and the retention and continuity of values and practices.
String, wind, and percussion instruments made of wood, bamboo, clay, hide, as well as some Twentieth Century Western materials are among the objects Johnson hand built himself is displayed. What’ll strike you if your not aware, is the hidden cultural symbolism. The sculptures and instruments were not built for music sake, they are mental time Blues travelers. As Johnson says, “spiritual food that begs for healing distance sounds”.
The objects were made over a period of 8 years, drawing upon his travels from Africa to little known places in the rural south. Sometimes just vibe’n with N.C. Artisitic Director Baba Chuck Davis.
"The Sounds I see, The sounds I feel" is the first exhibition created by an musician artist, instrument maker of African descent in the United States. Johnson the storyteller tells his story.
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