Radcliffe Bailey: Soundscapes

Verse Two, Radcliffe Bailey: Soundscapes, focuses on Radcliffe Bailey’s midcareer retrospective, Radcliffe Bailey: Memory as Medicine, as presented at the Davis Museum at Wellesley College in Massachusetts in 2012, anchored by four works of art—Pullman (2010), Transbluesency (1999), Echo (2012–16), and Windward Coast (2009–ongoing). This verse expands the boundaries of the sonic through Bailey’s corporeal experiences—and that of his spectators—through multilayered surfaces of glitter, mud, and various recycled materials. Musical and cultural influences that range from Bailey performing in Arrested Development’s southern rap video “Tennessee” to implementing the free jazz of Sun Ra and the birth of Afrofuturism within his art allow the artist to refashion meditations on the African resonances found, revised, and reproduced from Atlanta, Georgia, to Djenné, Mali, and even to Jupiter.