muhammad ali

Public Radio

Artists Talk with LVA: August 8, 2024

Larry Muhammad has written a new play, Who Killed Alberta Jones? and Brandi LaShay will play the title role in its world premiere from Redline Performing Arts at Actors Theatre of Louisville. Tune into WXOX 97.1 FM/Artxfm.com each Thursday at 10 am to hear Artists Talk with LVA.

Larry Muhammad is an award-winning playwright and producing director of Kentucky Black Repertory Theatre. His plays have been performed in New York at New Federal Theatre; in Louisville, KY at Actors Theatre, Kentucky Center for the Arts, Speed Art Museum, and Muhammad Ali Center; in Cincinnati, OH at the Aronoff Center; and the National Black Theater Festival in Winston-Salem, NC. They include: Looking for Leroy, Last Night at Mikell’s, Derby Mine 4, Jockey Jim, Double V

Brandi LaShay, is a native of Orangeburg, South Carolina. Brandi is an Alumnus of Claflin University and the University of Louisville's Theatre Arts Program. She furthered her career as a resident performer and Education Assistant at the St. Louis Black Repertory Company. She is currently certified in African American Theatre and serves the Louisville Community and JCPS as a Performance Practitioner and Resident Teaching Artist. In addition to her career as a freelance artist and performance Practitioner,  Brandi also works as the Museum Theatre Director at Historic Locust Grove. Brandi has been an inaugural creative partner with IdeasXLabs and the (Un)Known Project, which she last performed as Beverly in Journey’s to Freedom. Brandi identifies herself as a Dope Black Female Artist. DBFA is a label which defines the layers of her authentic creativity and artistic edge.

Redline Performing Arts presents Who Killed Alberta Jones? by Larry Muhammad
August 8-10 in the Victor Jory Theatre at Actors Theatre of Louisville.

Drawing

Vignette: Patricia Watson


“All my art is in some way about other art, even if the other art is cartoons.” — Roy Lichtenstein


Patricia Watson is a highly motivated educator with a successful track record for teaching art to elementary, middle, high school, and undergraduate students. She is also experienced in coordinating and managing arts programs. As an artist, she has most recently concentrated on illustrations of famous faces.

“I have always enjoyed portraiture drawing and painting. I decided to try high contrast portraits using sharpie markers as my choice of medium. It is permanent - with no margin for error.”

The technique invests even the most ordinary pictures with an iconic sensibility. Some of the subjects lend themselves very easily to this quality – it is arguable that ANY picture of Muhammad Ali or Salvador Dali is inherently iconic and, the portrait of 1970’s songwriter and musician Leon Russell, represents the moment he transitioned from session musician to Pop Star. Watson is affecting a deliberate layer of affectionate kitsch on images of individuals who have risen to a certain status in the Pop Culture firmament, harkening back to a period in which illustration dominated the media. In an age when such things seem all but forgotten, it would not be at all difficult to imagine these images on magazine or album covers. Ask your parents.

"Ali" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

"Ali" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

Watson also paints traditionally, and has recently been experimenting with abstract painting, but these sharpie portraits are popular with the public, and she is often asked to do commissions using the technique.

Watson is currently teaching at Meyzeek Middle School in Louisville, and she is a former Elementary and Middle Grades Art Instructor, Louisville Visual Art’s Children’s Fine Art Classes (CFAC).

Hometown: Louisville, Kentucky
Education: BA with a major in visual communications, Kean University, New Jersey; MAT - Teaching Art K-12, University of Louisville
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/artchikdiva/

"Chris" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

"Chris" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

"Dali" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

"Dali" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

"Gregg" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

"Gregg" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

"Leon" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

"Leon" by Patricia Watson, 11x14in, sharpie on paper

Written by Keith Waits. Entire contents copyright © 2017 Louisville Visual Art. All rights reserved.

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