Gary keeps several altars in her work space and sits with them daily. She has also become an avid reader of romance novels, which she keeps stacked around her studio. “I’m definitely fixing my sights — not just in a creative or professional sense but also in a personal sense — on love, in really trying to be heart centered and spirit led,” she says. Gary also takes seriously the tensions of desire and power that exist in those novels. In a pivotal clip from “The Giverny Suite,” Nina Simone muses on the anguishes of love during her spellbinding performance at the 1976 Montreux Jazz Festival.

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Persons: Gary, “, ”, She’s, ” Nina Simone, Malcolm X Organizations: Jazz, West 116th Locations: Harlem, West