Saturday, October 30, 2010



The Status Figure Monumento
One Man Circus

Kofi Fosu Forson


I thought of writing my autobiography. In retrospect who the hell am I?

I'm in my early 40's. I never felt better. I never looked better. Who the hell am I?

For starters I am Kofi Fosu Forson. Born and raised by Eugene and Eva Forson, two humble people with extraordinary egos. He a retired journalist. She a caterer and fashion designer. I am exactly the kind of person to be raised by these two people if some one had predicted my birth henceforth life. My mother is born of the first woman "Eve." She is the foreteller of death. My father's given middle name is "Evil-doer." My mother comes from a background of great men, artists, musicians and theater people. My father sat at the same roundtable with JFK and has traveled extensively covering conferences with some of the world's most powerful leaders.

So who am I and what does this make me? I am indeed the artist they had praytold me to be. At an early age they knew enough to send me to The Metropolitan Museum of Art summer program. As a passionate fan of sports I got enrolled in summer camp and became a star soccer player. A musician at heart I was quick to join a band in highschool, Xavier highschool, an all boys' parochial school, made to wear blazers and ties. I started a fashion trend when I wore a scarf around my neck. Somehow I was celebrity. Strangers walked up to me and called out my nickname "Fuzzy." At the talent show my nickname could be heard loud and clear "Fuzzy Fuzzy Fuzzy."

What then is to be expected of a black boy from Ghana, West Africa who is indoctrinated into white culture early on with its world of sex, art and music? He grows mad. And after a mental breakdown the several years that followed would define my life of psychiatrists. Therapy doesn't work for every one but I have learned if something is broken you fix it. I've had to fix my broken mind. And indeed I did. Months later I started studying at The School of Visual Arts which led to my stint at Hunter College and my degree in Creative Writing.

The 90's for me was all about a rebirth from depression and medication. I had to fight my way back to a form of maintenance. I had lost my virginity late and what followed was a combination of affiliations with great women more so than casual sex. Although I had my one true affair in this decade. Women for me were more or less muses. I incorporated them into my art. I did paintings of them and gradually found myself directing them in theater and in videos.

Professionally I wrote and directed Showcases for The Riant Theater. Served as a Press Co-ordinator for The Eickholt Gallery, through which I formed an affiliation with a Liverpool project called Transvoyeur. And currently I write for Whitehot Magazine.

What I've learned in this life is that survival is key. Actually its the most important thing as one gets older. As a young person we feel invincible. As time catches on we have mixed feelings about people, love and race relations. Currently soceity is faced with issues involving gender politics and generational politics. We seem alienated from each other much of this can be blamed on technology and culture on the world wide internet.

Independently I am blessed of the love of my mother and father. The constraints that which makes a family tortured and disfunctional has helped me grow. It has tested my spirit physically and emotionaly. Circumstances surrounding who I am can be traced through photographs of me from childhood to the present day. I always had a sense of character and fashion, a feel for poise and charisma. Somehow my father has influenced this. But a combination of my mother's glamour and my father's discipline has made me and brought me this far.

Survival as I mentioned is pertinent to the mental frame, the physical character and spiritual energy. The body can and must adapt to this that and any situation. Having lived in New York for the better part of my life I am now able to say I have matured. I have become this person. A person of self-identity and a talent for living. I went from being an introvert to a man who gives flowers to strange women and compliments them as they walk the streets much to their glorious surprise. And with my ego disciplined and masculinized I am able to ward of the psychical, verbal and physical approach and come-ons from men.

I have a fight in me now. I can challenge any one. I have secured a life that is my life.

A One Man Circus.

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