
Rashaad Newsome
A brocade covers the gallery floor and walls in Rashaad Newsome’s exhibition “To Be Real.” Its design is a collage of bejeweled flowers, gold chains, and mouths, all with lips parted and teeth bared to show off equally bejeweled grills. At the show’s center is Ansista (all works cited, 2019), a hybrid being, caught mid-vogue dip, formed from a nonbinary torso, a Chokwe Pho mask, the legs of a sex doll, acrylic nails, and Swarovski crystals. Being, a genderless chatbot with Ansista’s face, awaits visitors in a nearby theater. Although Being was taught to speak through the writings of bell hooks,