Vielmetter Los Angeles is pleased to present an exhibition of new photographs by Edgar Arceneaux, entitled Until, Until, Until...The Presidential Bookend Series (2015-2020). Marking Arceneaux’s eighth solo presentation with the gallery, the online exhibition features eight key photographic compositions archived from the performances of Until, Until, Until… —  Arceneaux's first live work, investigating the infamous 1981 performance ( and its aftermath) of Broadway legend Ben Vereen, televised nationally - but not in full, as part of Ronald Reagan's inaugural celebration. This suite of photos represents a graceful distillation of the arc and breath of this tragic story.

Ben Vereen, then a nationally celebrated Broadway and television actor, presented an homage to vaudevillian Bert Williams – America’s first mainstream Black entertainer as his offering for the Reagan inauguration. The final five minutes of Vereen's performance, a biting commentary on the history of Black performance, assimilation into white norms, and white supremacy, was censored for the television audience. As a result, there was a national outrage against Vereen, who performed in Black Face, as vaudeville performers had been required to do, which ultimately derailed  his career and reputation. Arceneaux's work, Until, Until, Until... is based on the footage that never aired that night in 1981. This piece questions the truth of past narratives and creates an opportunity to reconsider our collective understanding of historic events.

Taken from more than 40 hours of footage from performances across the US, the images that compose this photo series were projected on raw off-white canvas and rephotographed with a digital camera. Akin to a pointillist painting that becomes atomized the closer you look, the re-photography process adds another layer of mediation through colored grains and texture. For the artist, this additional information represents an attempt to get to a greater idea of truth. After five years of re-presenting, re-working, and re-staging the ongoing creation and performance of Until, Until, Until…, these eight images are Arceneaux’s attempt to look back on his engagement with theater, acting, and directing in a formal sense, and reflect on the work’s relevance through the lens of the past four years of regressive US politics — as well as the global protests inspired by economic collapse from the COVID-19 pandemic, the unjust police killings of Black and other people of color, and our personal feelings of despair, uncertainty, and hope. Simply put, the world is quite different than it was in 2015. 

Until, Until, Until… premiered in November 2015, one year before Donald Trump was elected President of the United States. Like many artists, the sense of dread and foreboding inspired Arceneaux to present Until, Until, Until… across the US and abroad on stage, on screen, and as an installation. In 2016 Arceneaux and LACMA curator Jose Luis Blondet organized a screening of Until, Until, Until… as a Counter Inaugural Event, happening the same night as Donald Trump was sworn in as President. Since then, Until, Until, Until... has tirelessly facilitated conversation and debate in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Seattle, DC, San Francisco, Providence, Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels, and Vienna. The project has also been featured with critical acclaim in such publications and press as the New Yorker, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Artnet, Art Practical, Boston Globe, Culture Vulture, KCET Artbound, Hyper Allergic, and Art Forum.

This November, Arceneaux aspires that this photographic presentation of Until, Until, Until… will be the bookend that marks the presidency of Donald Trump.

We invite you to view this excerpt of Until, Until, Until… courtesy of the artist and Vielmetter Los Angeles. For access to the view the full video, please email [email protected].

Edgar Arceneaux (b. 1972, Los Angeles) is an artist working in the media of drawing, sculpture, and performance, whose works often explore connections between historical events and present-day truths. Arceneaux has also had solo exhibitions at REDCAT, Los Angeles, CA; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Linz, Austria; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; and the Studio Museum Harlem, New York. His work has also been featured at the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Astrup Fearnley Museum of Art, Oslo; San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art; the Bronx Museum, New York; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Performa 15, New York; The Whitney Museum, New York, and the MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, Massachusetts, among other venues. The artist’s work resides in many public collections including the Whitney Museum, New York; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; The Ludwig Museum, Cologne; the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; the Orange County Museum of Art, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Arceneaux is currently an Associate Professor of Art for Roski School of Art and Design at USC; he currently lives and works in Pasadena, California.