Cairo's winter music and art festival Expo 93 kicks off with an art exhibition opening this Thursday, Jan. 14, 7 - 10 pm featuring the work of six of our favorite up-and-coming local artists. I interviewed Leena Joshi, Minh Nguyen, Mario Lemafa, Jordan Rundle, Lauren Rodriguez, and JD Banke about their inspiration, their process, and their works for Expo 93. More info / RSVP on Facebook here.

LEENA JOSHI

Featured on the cover of the current issue of City Arts as a member of their "Future List," Leena Joshi is a photographer, poet, musician and video artist who describes her work as identity-based, informal, and influenced by digital culture.  Last summer, she curated The Sun Never Sets: a night of art and performance by women of color at TMRW Party.

Her work for Expo 93 includes a one-night-only installation of a video (first screened at the Rose Gold popup at Glassbox Gallery last month) and photographic stills generated from the video, on display throughout the remainder of the exhibition.

I asked Leena some questions about her work and her inspiration:

Tell us about what you're making for Expo 93!

For EXPO, I'm working with images captured from video. Spending sustained time with video editing can sometimes create distance or intangibility, and when I feel boxed in or uninspired by a medium that I've been spending a lot of time with, it feels really good to move away from that medium.

What are you inspired by?

Right now I'm inspired by purposeful destruction, and finding the weird intersection between flamboyance and temperance. 

See more work on Leena's Tumblr.

MINH NGUYEN

Minh Nguyen, "we believe in jouissance madness holiness and poetry" (detail)

Minh Nguyen is another artist who thrives on cultivating diverse areas of practice. You may remember her distinctive illustration style from our Vibrations 2015 poster and t-shirt; since then, she's been hard at work co-creating a zine about the history of women in electronic music (these will be available at Expo, too!) She's also collaborating with Northwest Film Forum on a new project called Chat Room: A Series of Forums About Art in the Age of the Internet (the first one is coming up on Feb. 11). For her day job, Minh works as an exhibit specialist at the Wing Luke Museum. 

What medium are you working in for Expo? How did you get started in this medium?

It's a piece made of a drawing by hand and colored digitally, printed on fabric. I think often when you look at something I make, you can see my parallel interests in the imperfection and personality of hand-drawing, and in the bold sensibilities of graphic design. 

Tell me anything else you want people to know about your art for Expo 93!

I've been thinking about feminist sci fi, and my piece for Expo is a really straight-forward attempt. My piece is a simple idea of an alternate reality that doesn't use new technology for gendered domination, where cyborgs aren't built by men but build themselves and feel themselves.

What are you inspired by?

Very much, almost too much. Here are three things:
- Activists, I believe they have the largest imaginations of us all.
- People who actually make memes. I started making memes recently and it's a very vulnerable activity. Being funny on purpose is so hard.
- VNS Matrix, a cyberfeminist art collective from the 90s who made a lot of really irreverent and vulgar stuff that was also smart and grounded in critical theory. The name of this piece is from a line of their Cyberfeminist Manifesto for the 21st Century. I hope someone will be curious and look it up.

See more of Minh's work here: http://nightpong.tumblr.com/

MARIO LEMAFA

 

Mario Lemafa, "it all comes down." Digital Collage.

Mario Lemafa is a Seattle based queer indigenous artist who studied photomedia at the University of Washington. Their work has been shown at Glassbox Gallery, at Vermillion for the Mo' Wave festival, and they have a solo exhibition at Interstitial Theatre in February.

What medium are you working in for Expo? How did you get your start working this way?

The medium I am working in for the Expo is sourced digital collage.
I find a great deal of my early work, even my 4x5 film, to model a way of thinking about IMGs and to a good extent, the self, as multiples- aspects or facets of a continuous whole.
This is still a way of thinking that informs the way I do things, not necessarily every project, not necessarily medium specific either. I'd call it 'problem solving'.
I think rather than looking for a sense of 'purity' in a single IMG, I find fulfillment in making where components vibe/dialogue/inform the other in the work.
This approach also extends itself to spatial, architectural, and social elements too.

What are you inspired by?

Oh god- for real, lately i have been inspired by the animated show Steven Universe, femme artists locally/internationally, comedians, vertical lines, Erykah Badu's wise yet free attitude, black community organizers' capacities to continue fighting for social justice, Final Fantasy music, people who can cook, people who have greenery in their homes, and continually: sloths, my low key ambitious homies, and the late David Bowie :'\

Tell me anything else you want people to know about your art for Expo 93!

The work for Expo was inspired by Asian cuisine restaurant bathrooms I've been in. They can be very campy yet classy at the same time.

See more of Mario's work: http://madescent.tumblr.com/

 

JORDAN RUNDLE

Jordan Rundle. Cut paper collage

Digital artist, musician, and graphic designer Jordan Rundle is one of those rare artists whose work elicits simultaneous feelings of joy and dread; profundity and absurdity. His new cut paper collages for Expo 93 combine the saturated colors of his digital work with all the warmth and charm of something handmade.

How did you get started working with cut paper?

I have been making collages for a long time, but I began experimenting with this particular style only about three months ago after making a gig poster for my band. I wanted to get away from the computer for a while, and my workplace's studio had a bunch of assorted paper laying around. These fascinating factors led me to start anew with paper and glue.

What are you inspired by?

I visited a Matisse exhibition at MoMA about a year ago, and the influence is probably apparent. I'm interested in the ways that gestural forms and color combinations can form an implicit narrative or dialogue, independent of my intention. 

Is there anything else we should know about your art for Expo 93?

Each piece is a map to one of four sacred amulets that will precipitate the return of Qar'gneth.

See more of Jordan's work: http://www.jrdnrndl.com/

LAUREN RODRIGUEZ

Lauren Rodriguez has shown her mysterious, captivating photographs at a number of popup galleries and contributed images to recent album cover inlays by Rose Windows and The Cave Singers.  

What medium are you working in for Expo?

My pieces are prints from 35mm film photography. I prefer to alter my film before shooting with it to get different effects. Mostly in color.

How did you get started with film photography?

I started playing around with film simply because it was there. I had been gifted a pretty basic camera a few years ago  that I hardly used, and after a family death of a film enthusiast I was left several rolls of film that had expired decades ago. 

The colors were surreal, it felt like an epiphany. I'd always had extreme reactions to life around me and it felt like I could finally paint a similar picture for people to see, or relate to how I envision / feel moments. A chance to relate.

What are you inspired by?

For anything I share I'm always purely inspired by emotion. To depict the endless storm of trying to ride them; like any image trying to capture a moment that's real to you. in these shots, it's the feeling of relief to seamlessly connect to another kindred soul. 

See more of Lauren's work: https://www.instagram.com/lalalalaurn/

JD BANKE

JD Banke, "Don't H8." Acrylic on wood.

JD Banke is a longtime favorite here at Cairo. He had an exhibition with Lindsay Apodaca here in 2014 and is scheduled for a 2-person exhibition this March with Portland artist Lora Baize.

JD studied painting and printmaking at Cornish and his work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Two Shelves, Glassbox Gallery, Prole Drift and Vignettes in Seattle and Nationale in Portland. He has also shown at Good Mother Gallery in Oakland and Trestle Projects in Brooklyn and has been featured in New American Paintings. Last spring, he collaborated with choreographer Kate Wallich to create sets for her piece Splurge Lands at On the Boards.

How did you get your start working in your chosen medium?

I started painting and drawing ten or eleven years ago, i liked looking at painting books and magazines and decided to try it for myself.

What are you inspired by?

I like word play, social commentary, outsider art, pop art and whatever the current trends are.

Tell me anything else you want people to know about your art for Expo 93!

DONT H8

See more of JD's work: http://31colours.tumblr.com/