by Seph Rodney
In “The Let Go” at the Park Avenue Armory, the artist explores jubilation washed with spectacle and an undertow of anguish.
Sometimes on a Sunday, in the morning hours when the grass is still wet, and the city street is mostly quiet, people rise and dress, and gather in a church to sing, to dance, and to clap their hands. Sometimes the hymns are sung low and throbbing like an earth tremor and sometimes they emerge strained and agonized, screeching and searching. Sometimes an organ marks the path to ecstasy, or a drum circle, or a fully electrified band, or just a group of singers coordinated in matching outfits and choreographed formation.