Solara Saturnalia (Kawaii Kali REDUX)
Solara Saturnalia (Kawaii Kali REDUX) is a feature length film by artist Katie Cercone exploring Afro-Asiatic algorithms, Japanese appropriation of American Hip Hop and contemporary worship of the many faces of the Black Earth Mother. Filmed in Tokyo, Japan, SOLARA is a kaleidoscopic flow of third eye candy set to an original soundtrack by Alees Yvon and XHOSA. The film features rapper Kawaii Kali’s first recorded single.
A dynamic shape-shifting Goddess, SOLARA Saturnalia is a contemporary mythic figure whose siren signals the rebirth of the global hood. Amongst her many guises she represents 4 primary faces of the Great Mother: Solar/Sun energy associated with Japanese deity Amaterasu and Ganguro “heavily sunburned black face” as a form of her worship; myths of the snake and the rainbow tracing back to indigenous Buddha; Black Sailor Moon as a contemporary expression of the female Buddha Tara in her blue/black incantation, and creator/destroyer Kawaii Kali.
Starring “Egyptian Lovher” Alees Yvon & the Black Diamond Ganguro GAL Unit. Featuring Father, Yung Lean, Dos Global, Haruka Kurebayashi, Go! Push Pops, We Can Do Anything & More!
Katie Cercone ~ United States
Categories: Art/Abstract
DIRECTOR BIO:
Katie Cercone *Or Nah* is an artist, scribe, priextexx and spiritual gangsta hailing from the blessed coast. Cercone has performed or shown work in exhibitions at the Brooklyn Museum, Bronx Museum, Dallas Contemporary, Momenta Art, C24 Gallery, Changjiang Museum China, Dodge Gallery and Aljira Center for Contemporary Art. She has published critical writing in ART PAPERS, White Hot, Posture, Brooklyn Rail, Hysteria, Bitch Magazine, Utne Reader and N.Paradoxa. As co-leader of the radical, queer, transnational feminist collective Go! Push Pops, Cercone spearheaded a 400-women strong takeover of the Whitney Museum in 2014 known as “The Clitney Perennial,” and was awarded the Culture Push Fellowship for Utopian Practice the same year. In 2015 she was a J.U.S.F.C. Fellow for the U.S.-Japan Exchange Program in Tokyo. Her work has been featured in Dazed, MILK, Interview, Japan Times, Huffington Post, ART 21, Hyperallergic, PAPER, Art Fag City, Washington Post, and Art Net TV among others. Cercone has curated shows for Momenta Art, KARST (UK), Cue Art Foundation, Local Project and NurtureArt. Cercone is adjunct faculty at the School of Visual Arts where she teaches GENDER TROUBLE in the Visual & Critical Studies Department. A pioneer of Hip Hop Yoga Katie was awarded the Franklin Furnace Award Fund in 2020.
