Level Ground is proud to announce the team of curators crafting the second annual issue of SKEW, our experimental magazine that explores the dialogue between art, identity and culture. The team comprises four talented and inspiring Black artists: Lola Rose Eros (he/she/they); pastelShade (he/him; femme); Wikkid_Beat (she/her); and Leslie Foster (he/him).

From poetry to artwork to photography to essays and more, SKEW features exciting, thought-provoking new works from members of the Level Ground Collective and other artists based in/around Los Angeles. The first print issue of SKEW (get your copy here!) was released last October as part of our annual festival. Issue 02 comes out this November!

SKEW’s curators shape the voice, focus and content of each issue, taking cues from their own expertise and personal background as well as larger conversations occurring in our culture. In this often overwhelming period of history, we’re so grateful to have such a talented slate of curators to help us make sense of this year through the pages and artwork of SKEW.

Get to know our Curators

We’ll be sharing more in-depth interviews with each of our curators over the coming months, but for now, read on to learn about each member of the team, their artistic practice, and what projects they currently have in the works!

Lola Rose Eros (he/she/they)
@lola.rose.eros

Lola is the artistic pseudonym of Lauren Couch, a multifaceted artist whose work combines visual art with dance, fashion and self-portrait. Lola describes their artistic practice as “a spiritual pursuit of giving form and home to personal truths… I love to explore the idea of what freedom means in my art. The revolutionary act of cultivating deep love with one’s self and between Black Trans kin is a favored topic.”

Lola makes art to help her understand herself, to “digest life and transmit the messages I learn from living.” Because of this, his art cannot be separated from his Blackness, gender fluidity, and the space where ancestral experiences and his own lived experiences collide. Lola’s work also often draws on mythology and classical archetypes, kink, and the occult—and all of these elements combine to create fascinating and utterly original artistic projects like their ongoing self-portrait series, eros&persephone, which explores sexual-spiritual awakening through BIPOC kink spaces. Though eros&persephone is still a work in progress, you can see the seeds of this project on Lola’s Patreon.

pastelShade (he/him; femme)
@pas.telshade

.Turay is an interdisciplinary artist, DJ and collaborator. Under the name pastelShade, their aim as a DJ is to “cultivate ecstasy on the dance floor.” pastelShade’s sets often explore femme embodiment and sexual autonomy, selecting sounds that remind listeners of “the resiliency available to them through body movement, vocal exercise, & memory’s relationship with music.” pastelShade shares the intention behind their sets is “to develop and center a specifically BIPOC Queer Feminist liberatory consciousness through song and dance.”

As a writer and movement artist .Turay has danced and performed with the experimental dance company WXPT - The School for the Movement of the Technicolor people and published writing under Naked Narratives & Women’s Center for Creative Work. Their most recent project the BIPOC Virtual Listening Party, which they co-host with Cuties Coffee, happens every third Sunday. At each event, they mix a playlist of songs and albums offered by community members in response to the submission prompt of “sounds that are provide healing.” “The listening party was created as an act of community care,” says pastelShade. “The parties serve as a container to support healing through sound, movement, and community.” Visit Eventbrite to get a ticket for the next listening party. Please note this event is exclusively for BIPOC. In addition, you can check out the mixes from the first two listening parties on pastelShade’s soundcloud.

Wikkid_Beat (she/her)
@wikkid_beat

The artistic moniker of Karine Fleurima, Wikkid_Beat creates afrofuturistic performance art pieces that incorporate video, sound design and vocalizations to create an immersive and meditative environment. Her work explores themes of displacement, otherness, and interconnection while infusing elements of spirituality.

In addition to curating SKEW, Wikkid_Beat has several major projects in the works, including writing a TV pilot; teaching an online playwriting course; devising an online workshop about healing one’s inner child and cultivating mindfulness; and hosting virtual BIPOC sound healing sessions. “Meditation is a form of resistance. Bringing awareness to your mental states can help with the unraveling of intergenerational trauma,” she said. If you want to experience Wikkid_Beat’s creativity for yourself, join her for an Ancestral Sound Healing Session, which she will be hosting every Sunday in August at noon PST on Instagram Live (@wikkid_beat). Please note these events are exclusively for BIPOC.

Leslie Foster (he/him)
@leslie_muse

Leslie is an experimental filmmaker whose work explore Black and queer futurity through a lens of dream logic. He serves as the Director of Art Residency for Level Ground and is a founding member of the artist collective Museum Adjacent LA.

Leslie’s films are unapologetically confrontational about the realities of injustice and power, yet they often also offer a path toward healing and restoration for victims of injustice. That duality is intentional, Leslie said. “I want my work to be deeply uncomfortable for those who wield oppressive power (especially those unaware that they do), and I want my work to be a space of comfort for the people who fight back against those systems.” This duality can certainly be seen in his four-screen video installation, Heavenly Brown Body, a recent project he’s particularly proud of. Created with a group of collaborators, including producer Jessi Knippel, the piece depicts queer women of color as seers, using Mark Aguhar's poem "Litanies to my Heavenly Brown Body" as a queer liturgy that runs through the film. The film was originally shown as part of Adjacent, Adjacent, a group show at the Torrance Art Museum, and it is now available to watch for free at home on Vimeo.