ART AND THE MEASURE OF LIBERTY: The United Nations Turns 70

Baik Art presents Art and the Measure of Liberty: The United Nations Turns 70, a group exhibition of work by ten international artists honoring the 70th anniversary of the United Nations. The show moves from the United Nations exhibition space on 45th Street in New York to Baik Art on La Cienega Boulevard in Los Angeles with artists Ahmad Zakii Anwar, Danielle Dean, Gala Porras-Kim, Christine Nguyen, John Pai, Park Kyung Ryul, Shizu Saldamando, Lee Wan, Tintin Wulia, and Yeesookyung.

Each artist has been selected because his or her philosophies align with the pragmatic history of the United Nation’s mission—its accomplishments, activities, and goals—to keep peaceful global relations, facilitate social equality, protect the environment, and promote positive expressions of the human response to various trying conditions. Artists were carefully chosen because their distinct personal histories and social values are helping to shape a world free of boundaries by actively seeking to build bridges between communities and peoples through art. Every artist in the exhibition offers a level of awareness to pertinent issues that relate to their own interests. Whether their influence is presented by commenting on natural human tendencies and the cultural consequence that follow or by preserving some portion of humanity through a determined act of production, the participating artists in Art and the Measure of Liberty find the social elevation of all people worldwide to be of highest importance.

As the show opens in Los Angeles, we ask ourselves for an answer to the question: What has changed? Certainly, the geographical location has changed from New York to Los Angeles, but along with this change comes a different psychological space that allows for new interactions. Interactions that reflect the daily life found in America’s first decentralized city. If we consider each location—east coast and west coast—as two separate, but equally valuable cultural pools, the individual activations of each place creates its own rippling effect. Perhaps the currents will somehow touch when one meets the other, overlapping to create an arched and mutual understanding.