Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/1260974
BOLD BILLBOARDS AND WORDS THAT 56 T aking the conversation out of the galleries and onto the streets — literally, via billboards — is the impetus to the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth's Modern Billings initiative, which is particularly poignant since so many have recently taken to the streets for peaceful protests in reaction to the tragic death of George Floyd. The Modern's assistant curators of education, Jesse Morgan Barnett and Tiffany Wolf Smith, have created a series utilizing billboard space donated by Clear Channel Outdoor for artists to situate imagery and text onto billboards. Modern Billings positions the artwork in under-served communities adjacent to downtown Fort Worth along Jacksboro Highway and the Lancaster corridor. The Modern inaugurated the series with billboards by Mark Bradford, whose historic solo exhibition, "Mark Bradford: End Papers," opened at the museum shortly before the order came to shelter in place. (The exhibition title references the L.A.-based artist's works featuring end papers, the translucent paper squares used by African-American salons to protect hair during the permanent-wave process, which Bradford learned to use during his days as a hairdresser in his mother's beauty salon in South Central L.A.) For Modern Billings, Bradford culled through the archives of his long-time friend Cleo Hill-Jackson, founder of the African- American Cosmetologist Hall of Fame; the three resulting billboards bear images of the late Mr. LaMarr, a former hairdresser to St. Louis high society and a close friend of Hill-Jackson. See the video at PaperCity's Museums To-Go, papercitymag.com. Billy Fong GEORGE FLOYD'S LAST WORDS On May 30, as protests and support for Black Lives Matter began to swell in Dallas and beyond, many spotted photos of airplane banners presenting George Floyd's last words. The banners soared over five U.S. cities: "Please I Can't Breathe" in Detroit, "My Stomach Hurts" in Miami; "Everything Hurts" in L.A.; "They're Going to Kill Me" in New York; and "My Neck Hurts" in Dallas — all the result of Billboard of the late hairdresser Mr. LaMarr, from the archives of Cleo Hill-Jackson, selected by Mark Bradford for Modern Billings, at 5840 E. Lancaster Avenue, Fort Worth SOAR (continued on page 32) Mark Bradford in studio. Portrait Joshua White. COURTESY THE MODERN ART MUSEUM OF FORT WORTH.