Enamored of his Korean-American family, which landed deep in the heart of small-town Texas, Peter Ha, who now lives in Chicago, went back to his roots and presents us with softly shadowed color photographs of life on the old homestead. He depicts his kinfolk as unassuming people, deploying a restrained approach to them; indeed, a deep sense of languor permeates the images, the most dynamic of which captures one of Ha’s nephews with legs aloft and flailing, and the rest of his body hidden behind the side of a bed—what we might have thought was exuberant play turns out to be the result of falling off the bed. Ha’s banner photo shows his mother hunched on the side of a chair staring blankly into the void, as his father sprawls inertly on a couch behind her. There is no message here about immigrant angst—just a glimpse, delivered with affection and understated wit, of Ha’s American life. (Michael Weinstein)
Peter Ha’s “Affinities” shows through September 20 at Finch Gallery, 2747 W. Armitage, (312)622-8921.
Repurposing AI: A Review of Stephanie Dinkins at Stamps Gallery While this show is timely for everyone, I consider its setting within a university art gallery and emerging tech hub like the city of Ann Arbor a subversive provocation which Dinkins invites the greater public—including members of the university community—to consider our own positionality to AI and technology.
Lost in Translation: A Review of Crip* at Gallery 400 The strongest works in the exhibition succinctly express the ways the artist relates to their own body while calling out how the artist’s body and body of work has been perceived or coded against norms or ideals.
