HUGEAUX PHOTOGRAPHY - Conception Exhibition. Collaboration Text.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS - " it occurs to me, after some time being in communication with the artist Hugo Miller (Hugeaux), that this man is serving the African American artist community as a catalyst for change. he is directing our attention to the undeniable fact of cyberspace as being the new frontier for us to journey through as the force we are to be reckoned with. my respect for, appreciation, and admiration of Hugo Miller grows."

TEXT - Conception: The word conception can be defined in a number of ways. The first definition that comes to mind is the union of an egg by a sperm. This union will bring forth a new generation of the species. 2. Conception can also be defined as taking a raconcept and shaping and molding it into something specific.3. Conception can also be the results of a thought or idea or invention, or plan. 4. There is an old adage that says necessity is the mother of invention. But when you look at these definitions each of them can be loosely defined as the birth of or new form of something tangible. Examples: Written music for drums did not exist because drumming belongs to the percussion side of music. Western music is largely melodic therefore, a way to write music for percussion instruments had to be created. (The idea is hatched).

5. Another example is African dance, which is performed largely to percussion instruments. In order for an African dance to be created a happening must occur that the people choose to remember. Without an event or happening, the people have nothing to conceive. A good example to illustrate this is there was a marching band, which was about to start their performance when they heard a strange noise in the sky. The people looked up and shouted Agahun! Aga = Air and hun = vessel, in other words an airplane. This was the first time the people had seen an airplane so they created movement and set it to the already existing rhythm and called the dance Agahu to record in their oral history, the first sighting of an airplane.

6. In the case of Africa their dance is conceived from an event in history, which is recorded in the oral tradition through movement accompanied by music. This is how African dances are conceived. African dances are part of the lives of the people not fairy tales. 7. When Black people were transported here, the hair was not manageable so the straightening comb was invented. This is what happens when you snatch them from their ecological niche. Again it brings back the adage that necessity is the mother of all inventions.

8. The process of taking an abstract such as the sculptor takes a rock and chisels away at it and definite shape begins to emerge is another form of conception. 9. I can speak best about personal examples when I conceived the idea that music for percussion instruments could be written on paper and aligned with dance movements so they could both be read from a single integrated score. It arose out of the necessity that the music and dance of Africa was slowly disappearing each time the holders of it passed away. The foundation of the system was the use of subdivided and prolonged rectangles that date back to Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic math. This is using concept as something that someone thought up, and turned it into a reality. 10. The concept of using symbols to represent sounds then transcribing these sounds into written text that can be read by everyone is called 'shorthand' which also dates back to Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic writing.

These concepts provided the basis for percussion notation and dance notation. This reflects “concept” as how ideas are perceived, thus producing a product for the concept which it formerly lacked. 11. Conceptual art can be defined as art that is designed to expose an idea, rather than a work of conventional beauty.

EPILOGUE - l think u're onto something w/thiz latest collaboration -
how many black'z in the diaspora have blood tiez to indian
bloodlinez of collaboration ? / photo'z and spirit wordz . . .
bloodlinez of journeyz towardz home /a saga acrozz the divide
that open doorz to friendship from a communal entranceway
that challenged the illusional system of apartheidnezz and georgia - took photoz of her 101 year face and cld still see the indian/bloodlinez / the irish plantationlinez / and the blueblacklinez etched deeply in her beautiful sanctuary face -

reflecting her synopated rhythm of those beautiful bluez and indian chantz reminding the future that her diversity isn't a trick nor her own anticz of being a trickster of hipnezz but an affirmation of communal ethoz that continuez to fight against the system that based itself on apartheid and clazz-slight-of-hand blackening in peeping from behind the box or cloning itself to harmonize in nature'z beauty . . .cloudy skiez might linger longer in winter freezing momentz of still waterz that crystalize thiz unseen beauty that doesn't realize it'z own beauty - the dark red sunlight echoing dusk'z calling card still lingerz like summer bronziez bathing itz long laugh of hotnezz soon to come /camera'z eyez remembering and spirit wordz declaring their own beauty together gaining a victory over chaotic self-hatred visionz /