Thesentür: Criticism on the Corner Project

Thesentür: Conscientious Objector to Formalism, by artist Theodore A. Harris, is a series of minimal image- and quotation-based works that uses poetry to confront mainstream art criticism and art history, to look beneath the surface politics of aesthetics and formalism in a presentation of art that is not self-referential or to put a Black face on the art history of imperialism. Formalism functions as the cosmetics of art criticism like aluminum siding on a slumlord’s property. It is an attempt to disguise what is crumbling beneath the surface politics of its proselytizing church bells, ringing, in the megachurch / museums and galleries where there are more Black bodies guarding the white cube than exhibiting in it. What marginalized artists know is that canon formation is a battlefield and critical art is the weapon! In the crossed out words of Basquiat to repel ghosts.

Pictured on the cover is a mockup of the corner store where once there was a gray area where cigarette and cigar ads once were, an advertising space on the corner store situated at the end of my block at 15th and Morris Streets (S. 1700 block). After noticing it had been vacant for awhile, I talked with the store owner of Morris Mkt, David Shek, about occupying the unused ad space for rotating artworks from my long running series Thesentür: Conscientious Objector to Formalism Thesentür series – THEODORE A. HARRIS. He agreed.

These pieces are usually exhibited in contemporary art galleries and museums, but for this project they would become public art to engage with anyone walking by, waiting for the 29 bus, or entering the corner store. At first glance, you might think it’s an ad for Dutchmaster Cigars because of the font and the figures from the Rembrandt van Rijn painting titled The Sampling Officials of the Amsterdam Drapers Guild (1616)– this image is in fact used on the Cigars. Upon second glance, though, this format is a vehicle for a larger conversation on art and art criticism created to raise questions or make pronouncements that the Dutchmans would never have said.

My proposal, titled Thesentür: Criticism on the Corner Project, engages the public in a poetic artspeak conversation about the function of art in our lives. Whereas the larger series delves into a wide range of art criticism and the underlying nuances beneath their surface politics, this series would focus more so on our daily lived experience and how art connects to our immediate history, especially on the corner.

The twelve week project features installations in the advertising space in which the prints change every 1-2 weeks.

Four of the selected quotes for the series include:

Can art history stop a bullet? – Jacqueline Francis

Art Saves Lives! – Jane Golden

You can do anything in the world, and you did that? – Erin Bernard-Harris

If your history is bad, can your theory be good? – Katy Siegal

Political art is art because it is political. – Meike Bal

Thesentür: Conscientious Objector to Formalism series Interviews and reviews

Thesentür series – THEODORE A. HARRIS

Theodore A. Harris: Master Unmasker of Hidden Histories / John Heon – ASAP/Review

After Somebody Blew Up America: An Interview with Theodore A. Harris and Jonathan P. Eburne – ASAP/Review

Interview with Theodore A. Harris – FIELD

Third Text

Artblog | Theodore A. Harris brings Nina Simone, Rembrandt and The Curtis Institute together in book and exhibit

About the Artist

Theadore A. Harris. Photo by Brent Reany.

Theodore A. Harris (1966-) is a Philadelphia-based visual artist and poet. His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally and is in private and public collections such as Libraries and Museums University of Delaware, Fort Garland Museum and Cultural Center, University of New Mexico Art Museum, Saint Louis University Museum of Art, La Salle University Art Museum, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, McGill University Visual Arts Collection, Center for Africana Studies; University of Pennsylvania, Kislak Center Rare Books and Manuscript Library; University of Pennsylvania, and the Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art, and the Winston and Carolyn Lowe Collection. Harris is the co-founder of the Anti-Graffiti Network/Philadelphia Mural Arts Program. Harris has also co-authored and authored books including Our Flesh of Flames (2019), Malcolm X as Ideology (2008) with Amiri Baraka, TRIPTYCH with Amiri Baraka and Jack Hirschman (2011), i ran from it and was still in it with Fred Moten (2007), and Thesentür: Conscientious Objector to Formalism (2017). He is the Founding Artistic Director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Black Aesthetics. He is a 2022 Visual Artist Fellow CFEVA (Center For Emerging Visual Artists).