Negarra A. Kudumu

08/01/2019

Summer update! - The August 2019 Newsletter from Negarra A. Kudumu | Art + Healing

FORTHCOMINGSeattle Art Fair kicks off Friday August 2nd! I will be in and around the fair all weekend so if you see me, please say hello! Three great public programs and two exhibition openings at the Frye Art Museum in August and September: 

06/06/2019

Summer is upon us! The June newsletter from Negarra A. Kudumu | Art + Healing

https://mailchi.mp/73d606309a94/almost-spring-1459417

05/16/2019

Survey: Healing-focused Membership program.

Please help us by sharing your feedback. Thank you!

The purpose of this survey is to gauge interest in a healing-focused membership program offering the following benefits:  exclusive access to reliable and actionable information offered in real time via an online community about the healing modalities offered by  Nega

05/09/2019

In lieu of a blog post but still thinking, talking, and doing the same things I always do in this far left hand corner known as Seattle. Grateful especially to my beloved Stellies who inspire me in ways felt but unseen. Also for Amal who in this art game, is my elder. Read her words that I shared with you yesterday on Venice and think twice before you wax critical.⁣
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Please enjoy.⁣
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05/02/2019

NEW POST! On Healing: Where and How It Happens
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Excerpt, “These conversations were and are about very real issues happening within and affecting Isese, Lukumi, and Candomble Ketu traditions: the proliferation of political Ifa; the disregard for license, authorization and regla (generally accepted standards of practice); ceremonies, namely initiation, being done incorrectly; initiation without training, and the increase and normalization of fraud and charlatanry. Here’s the catch: none of these issues are new. I have been in and around Lukumi and other Afro-Cuban spiritual communities for 14 years and its the same conversations. Elders and colleagues who have been around double or triple that time, tell me the conversations are the same. The one, underlying thread running through all of them was this: none of them centered the lived realities of doing healing and being healed.”⁣
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On April 15, I posted an earnest question in a private Facebook group that exploded and sent much reverb throughout said group, related groups, and some of the english speaking population of Isese, Lukumi, and Candomble Ketu practitioners. Subsequent posts ensued. One was my own where I called out t

05/01/2019

This one was a real pleasure. Thank you Mariane Ibrahim Gallery, Mwangi Hutter, Sebastian P. Baden, and Kunsthalle Mannheim.

Available for purchase at the Museum shop.

04/30/2019

On April 9th, Brainard Carey of WYBCX Yale radio interviewed me about my art and healing practice. It was an awesome opportunity and a joy to share what I do.

Thank you and please enjoy. H/t Sharon Arnold, Director Bridge Productions.

Negarra A. Kudumu works simultaneously as a healer, essayist, curator, and independent scholar of contemporary art. She engages with pre- and post-colonial artistic and spiritual outputs of West an…

04/29/2019

Latest writing for Squire Broel solo exhibition at Katzen Arts Center - American University.

“Marking the Spot: Squire Broel’s Totemics” by Negarra A. Kudumu

Marking the Spot: Squire Broel’s Totemics Within the broad subset of items that are considered totems, ultimately they are vessels of stories whose provenance speaks of time and place, and of course human experience. They…

04/25/2019

NEW BLOG POST! Art and Moral Imperative: entry-level thoughts

Excerpt, “I am also thinking about the ways in which art is separate from most other aspects of human life. Perhaps if art had not been separated from the rest of lived experience, and transformed into an endeavor with an output that is a consumer product and thus commodified, there may be less of a gap between it and moral imperative. I am thinking of what happened to societies that specialized in making certain kinds of objects - with both aesthetic and functional utility - and the taking of those objects by settler colonialists to be fetishized and sold, oft multiple times for decades if not centuries. How has the removal of these objects halted the holistic development of societies where making wasn’t just about having a thing to look at, but rather about process, meaning, and utility throughout the course of lived experience?”

Heart Scarab of Hatnefer, Serpentinite, gold, ca. 1492–1473 B.C. Courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art collection. Since about the end of March I have started aggressively question what is the point of all this fuss we (yes, i implicate myself) make about art. For all the talking I do about w...

04/05/2019

Spring Is Here! The April 2019 Newsletter from Negarra A. Kudumu | Art + Healing https://mailchi.mp/1a75ec8d655e/almost-spring-1414461

CORRECTION: The date listed in the first paragraph should read May 13. :)

04/04/2019

NEW BLOG POST! Why return to our ancestral traditions?

Excerpt, "In conversations with colleagues and clients, the question often arises about why we, at a certain point, feel pushed towards a spiritual connection. It was only until I was midway through an intense transitional phase of my own, last fall, that I really got clear on it. The info came as a result of a divination done for me by my godmother where we parsed a specific subset of my challenges attempting to source their origin. What she said next was profound, and I continue to ponder it to this day. She said, we put down our indigenous traditions."

In conversations with colleagues and clients, the question often arises about why we, at a certain point, feel pushed towards a spiritual connection. It was only until I was midway through an intense transitional phase of my own, last fall, that I really got clear on it. The info came as a result of

03/21/2019

NEW BLOG POST! Vernal Equinox + Full Moon in Libra: notes and recommendations⁣
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Excerpt, “Spring is here, HURRAH! After a harshly cold and snowy winter in the Pacific Northwest, I am ready for the higher temps. I am also ready for spring art events, spring cooking and eating, and ongoing healing leveraging the properties of my favorite spring herbs. But what does any of it mean?”⁣
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Spring is here, HURRAH! After a harshly cold and snowy winter in the Pacific Northwest, I am ready for the higher temps. I am also ready for spring art events, spring cooking and eating, and ongoing healing leveraging the properties of my favorite spring herbs. But what does any of it mean? Vernal