BRATTLEBORO — In a free Zoom presentation, artists Delano Dunn and Susan Luss, baker Megan Sway, and Dunn’s mother, Diane Mangle, will work together (virtually) to make pies, discuss African American foodways, and eat, as the old Creoles used to say, “melt-in-your-mouth deliciousness!”
Presented by the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center, “Pâte Brisée: A Conversation with Four Pies,” will take place on Thursday, July 29, at 7:30 p.m. Register and find more information at brattleboromuseum.org.
This online event is offered in connection with the exhibit “Delano Dunn: Novelties,” on view at the museum through Oct. 11. The presenters, hailing from different regions in the U.S., will make pies that represent their culinary heritage. As they bake together, Dunn, Luss, Sway and Mangle will discuss their memories and associations with pie and other foods that have special meaning to them.
“Delano Dunn: Novelties,” the artist’s first solo museum show, brings together two bodies of work that explore love, racial identity, family history and the experience of making art during quarantine. “Paradise” incorporates collaged elements from several sources, including Walt Disney’s 1947 “Uncle Remus Stories,” which are widely viewed as racist today. “Roux” explores issues of cultural appropriation via the artist’s tightly guarded family culinary traditions.
Through painting, mixed media, and collage, Dunn explores questions of racial identity and perception in various contexts, ranging from the personal to the political, and drawing on his experience growing up in South Central L.A. His work has appeared in solo exhibitions in New York, Los Angeles, and elsewhere. In 2017, he was nominated for the prestigious United States Artists Fellowship and received the Sustainable Arts Foundation Individual Artist’s Grant. Dunn has been featured in The New York Times, VICE Media’s The Creators Project, and Hyperallergic.
Luss is an interdisciplinary artist living in New York City who works with a range of found and other materials. She received her M.F.A. from the School of Visual Arts and her B.F.A. from Pratt Institute. Luss has exhibited her work at various venues in the New York area and beyond, and her work is in public and private collections, including La Table des Artistes in Paris.
Founded in 1972, the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center presents rotating exhibits of contemporary art, complemented by lectures, artist talks, film screenings, and other public programs. The museum is open Wednesday through Sunday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is on a “pay-as-you-wish” basis. The museum, in historic Union Station in downtown Brattleboro at the intersection of Main Street and routes 119 and 142, is wheelchair accessible.
Brattleboro Museum & Art Center is supported in part by the Vermont Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional support is provided by Allen Bros. Oil, Brattleboro Savings & Loan, C&S Wholesale Grocers, the Four Columns Inn, Sam’s Outdoor Outfitters, and Whetstone Station Restaurant & Brewery.