Wed., Sept. 30 - Sun., Oct. 25, 2020

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The Art and Culture Center/Hollywood is pleased to present a special screening of the 2011 documentary, MAKE, directed by Scott Ogden and Malcolm Hearn. The 68-minute film will be screened through Oct. 25 in the Center’s Main Gallery. 

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MAKE is an intimate journey into the lives of four American self-taught artists: Prophet Royal Robertson, Hawkins Bolden, Judith Scott and Ike Morgan. Isolated and struggling with the disabilities life has dealt them, these artists all find their most powerful voice through art. Using the simplest of materials, they each produce work that is both sublime and at the same time completely their own. Primarily driven by scenes of the artists creating, their interwoven stories are told by the artists themselves as well as through family and friends whose lives they have touched.

 

Royal Robertson (1936-1997) covered every inch of his Baldwin, Louisiana home and yard with hand-made signs and apocalyptic paintings. Visitors of this self-proclaimed prophet were greeted with large, weather-beaten signs warning “NO DIVORCE WHORE'S ALLOWED” (sic) and “ALL CRAZY PERSONS KEEP OFF LOT” before entering his home.

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Once inside, shrines to his both beloved and despised ex-wife, Adell, came into focus amid poster board renderings of future cities, space autos, couples engaged in sex, and detailed calendars chronicling his daily woes. Referencing sources as disparate as the Bible, science fiction magazines, pornography, and cheap tabloid newspapers, his work manages to graphically illustrate the daily concerns that occupied his mind, both real and imagined.

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Hawkins Bolden (1914-2005) was a self-taught artist who lived his entire life in Memphis, Tennessee. At the age of seven, Bolden was left completely blind following a baseball accident involving his twin brother. Later in life, he began scavenging the alleyways and fields around his home in search of discarded materials, litter and other debris with which to work.

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Utilizing only his sense of touch, he created a vast number of scarecrows, tall totems and mask-like objects from these found materials to protect his backyard vegetable garden from pests and predators.

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Ike Morgan (b. 1958) is a self-taught artist who lives and works in Austin, Texas, and spends almost every waking moment creating art. As he often says, “it helps to pass the time away.” Over the years, he has produced thousands of haunting paintings and drawings depicting the United States Presidents, the Mona Lisa, religious icons and scenes, and pictures inspired by photographs of nature.

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Judith Scott (1943-2005) was born in Columbus, Ohio. Scott was institutionalized for most of her life due to Down Syndrome and deafness. She was primarily isolated until 1987 when she was introduced to Creative Growth, a non-profit in Oakland, California, that provides studio space and supplies to artists with developmental, mental, and physical disabilities. Scott immediately took to mixed media and for the remainder of her life she created sculptures using yarn, twine, and strips of fabric, to wrap, weave, and knot. Her deeply complex process alludes to both ritual and play. These sculptural objects often contained hidden everyday objects such as keys, plastic tubes, and bicycle wheels. The vibrant sculptures, often compared to nests or cocoons, allowed her to express herself in new imaginative ways. 

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Scott lived in Dutch Flat, California, and continued making art until she passed away in 2005.

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Scott Ogden and Malcolm Hearn are based in New York. Ogden is the founder of SHRINE, New York.