The Artist: Shaun Leonardo
“Leaders and thinkers in all areas should consider how returning to ‘normalcy’ as we once held, is a return to inequity.”
5 Questions with Shaun Leonardo
Visual Artist
Brooklyn, New York
Shaun Leonardo’s multidisciplinary work negotiates societal expectations of manhood, namely definitions surrounding black and brown masculinities, along with its notions of achievement, collective identity, and experience of failure. His performance practice, anchored by his work in Assembly – a diversion program for court-involved youth at the Brooklyn-based, non-profit Recess, is participatory and invested in a process of embodiment. Leonardo is a Brooklyn-based artist from Queens, New York City. He received his MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute, is a recipient of support from Creative Capital, Guggenheim Social Practice, Art for Justice and A Blade of Grass, and was recently profiled in the New York Times. His work has been featured at The Guggenheim Museum, the High Line, and New Museum, with a recent solo exhibition at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). From fall 2018 through spring 2020, Leonardo enacted socially engaged projects at Pratt Institute as the School of Art, Visiting Fellow. elcleonardo.com. Images of Leonardo’s work follow this interview.
1. As an artist with an incredibly physical and participatory practice, how has your work been impacted?
Quite honestly, I have felt a real void – an emptiness while in isolation. My work relies on the act of physical embodiment, and therefore, requires the intensity and intimacy of real space and real time to be with people, and to guide communities toward a reckoning with one another’s experiences and subjectivities. I have been convincing myself that when the time comes, however, social practitioners, like myself, will have to lead the way in creating different spaces of engagement and in conceiving of new forms of belonging.
2. We are seeing all programming go virtual. From your perspective, how can this be leveraged to demystify the role — and life — of artists, and to broaden cultural audiences and supporters?
I will answer this differently. I have first been asking myself, “How can these virtual exchanges point to more democratic, inclusive spaces?” With a few great exceptions like Queens Museum, Pioneer Works, and Museum of the City of New York, I think we have seen institutions reach incredible difficulty in translating their programs with responsiveness to these seemingly impossible times and relevance to the communities that are most impacted. It points to the surface level engagement that has been enacted over the years to simply satisfy the mandate for community-based programming.
3. This crisis is starkly exposing the inequities in our society, perhaps finally opening the eyes of many who previously did not want to acknowledge our problems. How might artists and creatives most effectively keep this discussion at the forefront and continue to drive it forward?
I do believe we have to be relentless in the days, months, years to come when and where possible. I often feel like it is the responsibility of the artist to provide a visual language that seeks to make sense of our confusions and even possibly, guide us toward how to live better lives. This was true for me before the risks and dangers of COVID-19, though, and seems ever more urgent. I will also say that it should not be the sole responsibility of artists and creatives. Leaders and thinkers in all areas should consider how returning to “normalcy” as we once held, is a return to inequity. We should all be taking time to conceive of new approaches in our lives and work that will confront power structures. The longing for connection that we are experiencing now, while separated, will subside. Compassion and connection require action… and without it, are an empty gesture.
4. As a visiting fellow at Pratt, what do you anticipate being the long-lasting impacts on arts education?
I’m not sure what I want for arts education, but I do know as a father, artist, and educator that video conferencing is not it. Participants have little to no agency in the platform, and therefore, the exchange becomes one-sided. Students will always crave community. I truly believe the most radical experimentation should take place in our school systems to ensure connectivity.
5. This crisis could change the landscape of cultural patronage. In your view, how does it most urgently need to evolve?
Unfortunately the answers have been in front of us for years. I spent 15 years in museum education so know that this critical dialogue has lingered for some time now. I must attribute much of the below thinking to conversations I’ve had with my former colleague Emily Mello (Associate Director of Education, New Museum), Libertad Guerra (formerly of Loisaida and current Executive Director of The Clemente) during my time in the Education Department at New Museum, and John Hatfield (Executive Director, Socrates Sculpture Park where I worked for 11 years and now serve on the board).
Institutions need to be sustained differently. As cultural spaces compete for programming funds, we see a focus on temporary initiatives and less consideration for what continues to build the foundation of an organization in what it does best. Programmatic dollars dictate seasonal efforts, and therefore, are not invested in the brilliant educational staff, for example, who carry them out.
Artists should determine the use of their program and outreach budgets. Artists quite often know and can create the better paths toward community engagement in their work. Institutions should share decision-making power with the artists they purport to support.
Fund ecosystems… How would institutions look at themselves differently if, rather than self-proclaimed expertise, equitable collaborations were awarded instead—partnerships with resident associations, smaller grass roots organizations, neighborhood coalitions—with funds distributed to both entities? How would that force larger institutions to leverage their resources differently and through a socio-political lens?
Let black and brown people lead the way. Diversity Initiatives, Inclusion Departments, token Board Positions, Community Councils… we have to stop. If power does not truly reside in these efforts, and instead, remains contained and consolidated as it has always been, then we must start having some difficult conversations for developing alternative, actionable steps. And finally, while I offer my insights here, I must say much of the guidance and necessary imagination is provided within The People’s Cultural Plan.
Cultural patronage should be directed towards (and enforce) all of the above.
Shaun Leonardo’s multidisciplinary work negotiates societal expectations of manhood, namely definitions surrounding black and brown masculinities, along with its notions of achievement, collective identity, and experience of failure. His performance practice, anchored by his work in Assembly – a diversion program for court-involved youth at the Brooklyn-based, non-profit Recess, is participatory and invested in a process of embodiment.
Leonardo is a Brooklyn-based artist from Queens, New York City. He received his MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute, is a recipient of support from Creative Capital, Guggenheim Social Practice, Art for Justice and A Blade of Grass, and was recently profiled in the New York Times. His work has been featured at The Guggenheim Museum, the High Line, and New Museum, with a recent solo exhibition at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). From fall 2018 through spring 2020, Leonardo enacted socially engaged projects at Pratt Institute as the School of Art, Visiting Fellow. elcleonardo.com (Photo by Lelanie Foster)
Primitive Games - performance, 1 hr. at Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY, 6/21/18. Photo by Vincent Tullo for the New York Times.
Primitive Games - performance, 1 hr. at Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY, 6/21/18. Photo by Vincent Tullo for the New York Times.
Workshop, Primitive Games. Photo by Seyhr Qayum, Emma Seely, and Lodewijck Kuijpers.
Workshop, Primitive Games. Photo by Seyhr Qayum, Emma Seely, and Lodewijck Kuijpers.
Workshop, Primitive Games. Photo by Seyhr Qayum, Emma Seely, and Lodewijck Kuijpers.