Tony Cokes at Greene Naftali reviewed by Martha Schwendener for The New York Times @nytimes “Critical and cultural theory serve as raw materials in Tony Cokes’s videos, which consist of texts against bright backgrounds accompanied by driving, thumping soundtracks. The six works in “On Clubbing, Mourning and Critique” at Greene Naftali were all made in the last few years and address issues of race and global inequity — except for “Evil.48 (fn.know.it.alls)” (2012), which quotes conservative figures stating their views on reproductive policies and serves as an eerie portent for the recent overturning of Roe v. Wade. “Evil.13.5 (4 OE)” (2022) is a nearly 20-minute video that samples sections from a 2015 interview with the curator Okwui Enwezor, who died in 2019, describing how a market in Lagos sells obsolete Western goods, calling into question the idea of “recycling” as a universal panacea. Other videos examine police brutality and the politics of dance music, using texts and lectures by cutting-edge Black intellectuals like Tina Campt, Saidiya Hartman and Kodwo Eshun. What’s changed recently in Cokes’s work is the arrangement and display of text, which has gotten looser and more consciously shaped and arranged, like concrete poetry. Similarly, rather than merely pointing out the various “Evils” of his titles, Cokes has shifted subtly to suggesting new activist futures, which is also the result of borrowing from a younger generation of thinkers and performers whose approach is often more playful and pragmatic than the pessimism of many postmodern thinkers.” “On Clubbing, Mourning, and Critique” is on view through August 5. Summer hours: Monday - Friday, 10 AM - 6 PM Pictured: Tony Cokes, Testament A: MF FKA K-P X KE RIP, 2019, HD video, color, sound, 35:22 minutes #TonyCokes