Friday, March 9, 2012

Winding It Up: Kehinde Wiley's Party And All Dat Attitude

DJ Spooky aka "DJ EXTRA-ORDINAIRE"

Photographer Johnny Nunez "Hmm, do I bum-rush with attitude or do I..."

Artist Kehinde Wiley "Glitterati Squad"

Artist Kehinde Wiley had his "launch/preview" party last night at "a local cultural institution" on the east side. "Kehinde Wiley/The World Stage: Israel" which runs now thru July 29th. "The Wind Up" MC Kalkidan and DJ Spooky hosted the party ran from 8:30 to 11pm. I had the pleasure of watching Kehinde, DJ Spooky and hip-hop photographer Johnny Nunez all come in (at separate times) and grace us with their "savant" presence; Kehinde a-la entourage showed up around 8:25pm, his "Blackerati Squad" (Black/Glitterati Fab Bunch)" showed up looking fab and of course Kehinde and his "look at me, look at me" suit/attire garnered much attention in his direction; one mistake the famed artist did make, he didn't greet the employees that were working at the front desk; "hey Kehinde like I wrote (in my last blog post about you) manners and friendliness go a VERY long way," "damn Kehinde you could've taken five seconds out of your busy schedule to greet us peons we would have been loyal followers for life, but "no you couldn't but help yourself and felt the need to" "ignore us", you known the "non-entities" that we are, "oh well you can't win them all;" "p.s Kehinde if Maira Kalman can be gracious so can you! Hey DJ Spooky "are you trying to cause an "international incident" at the "Museum?" Yeah I know you're way too important to go through the museums metal detector, not that we (at the "Museum") don't have a good reason to have a metal detector at the museum anyways; yeah we know that the museum has never had past threats from resourceful terrorists "wanting to blow up the museum, employees and all" so yeah I know its a "major" inconvenience for you, the "internationally known and famous hip-hop DJ "extraordinaire" so yeah of course the museums' security team are trying to "make your life impossible" because they have no other important matters to attend to, such as oh I don't know "preventing the museum being a target to of terrorism"! Hey "Spooky if you would have engaged your listening skills (poor one at that;and by the way DJ Spooky, like didn't you go to the prestigious school Bowdoin College? What's up with DAT? Playa' playa' please "Spooky next time around, pay attention!) you would have gotten your set of rules/protocols of the museum the first try and realized that "NO you didn't need to go through the metal detector" but through the employee/staff entrance a few feet away from the main entrance and you could have avoided looking and sounding like a oh I don't know a major"tool "when you quote un-quote stated "I'm the DJ how do I get into the museum cause I'm not gonna go through security" hey Spooky you can thank staff/employee Ben Parrish for escorting "you" "the directionally challenged DJ EXTRA-ORDINAIRE" to the staff entrance so that "you" the DJ EXTRA-ORDINAIRE made it safe and sound to provide the party guest extra-ordinary music that night; pay attention Mr/DJ Bowdoin College graduate in french literature and philosophy, pay attention! Last but not least Johnny Nunez, El senor Nunez whom I had the pleasure of listening to him lecture a few years back at my Alma mater Lehman College, (it's no Bowdoin College but guess what "Spooky" my listening skills are superb and my menial little CUNY education offered a course "Listening Skills 101", "yeah I know I'm not a millionaire like yourself but I do know I don't make a total tool out of myself 99.99% of the time".) El nino Nunez showed up, camera and all (no entourage) around 9:30; self-important Johnny didn't feel the need to stop at the front desk and provide us with his name for the VIP list holder; because "of course Johnny all of the "mighty-whiteys" should know whom Johnny Nunez is", the famed hip-hop photographer, whom had a tough life, and also happen to have had a documentary made of his journey as a struggling minority photographer, which I did happen to see (and Johnny might I add the documentary was well done) "Johnny come on already loose the "tude" not everybody knows of/about you; this is an institution and you are hip-hop/Latino photographer, get it! who knows you all might see/spot the pint-sized artist selling his wares at a "pop-up" store in the museum? But then again hopefully Kehinde will shell out some dough and hire Farnsworth Bentley and teach Kehinde how to dress to impress, at least the right way! - Madame J.

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