#shadows took shape

[afrofuturistaffair]

Space may have been the place for jazz visionary Sun Ra, but there is another location that has often been excluded from discussions of Afrofuturism: the ocean. From the mythic, underwater world of Drexciya, to the music of Azealia Banks and the artwork of Ellen Gallagher, the ocean has flooded several modes of black cultural expression. Join the Studio Museum for a trans-disciplinary dialogue that conceptualizes "black aquatic space" as it relates to the global production of black science fictions across film, theory, literature, music and contemporary art.

Organized by Jared Richardson, PhD candidate in Art History at Northwestern University, this discussion features Alexander G. Weheliye, Professor of English and African American Studies at Northwestern University.

Feb 6, 2014 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM

Studio Museum in Harlem Theater

Photo: The Otolith Group (Kodwo Eshun and Anjalika Sagar) | Hydra Decapita (video still), 2010 | Courtesy the artists and Lux UK 

- See more at: http://www.studiomuseum.org/event-calendar/event/the-black-aquatic-and-afrofuturism-2014-02-06#sthash.ygU873Vm.dpuf

[shadowstookshape]

Mendi and Keith Obadike, American Cypher, 2012-2013

American Cypher is a meditation on American stories about race and DNA. It is a site-specific installation consisting of multi-channel sound, video, and a series of letterpress prints for created for exhibition at The Studio Museum in Harlem. At the center of the project is a sound art piece originally commissioned by Bucknell University entitled Stereo Helix for Sally Hemings. Companion works including a performance and book were also created for this project. The letterpress work for the piece was produced with Intima Press/Mindy Beloff and the animation work was done with Moonrabbitz/Yuki Nakajima.

Stereo Helix for Sally Hemings is a sound installation co-commissioned by the Bucknell University Griot Institute for Africana Studies and the Samek Art Gallery. It reflects on the relationship between Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson. It uses the sound of Sally Hemings' bell, given to her by Thomas Jefferson’s wife, Martha Jefferson, as a focal point. The sound recording has been manipulated in order to derive multiple textures, pitches, colors and effects from the bell, whose sounds have been mixed in the installation in real-time with ambient field recordings from Jefferson's Monticello plantation. The sound plays from moving speakers in the stairwell of Bucknell's Elaine Langone Center, emitting an extremely narrow beam of sound in a spiraling double helix-like pattern.

[afrofuturistaffair]

Take a look at photographs of Cyrus Kabiru's C-Stunners, the artist's futuristic eyewear on view in The Shadows Took Shape. Then, join a workshop in which participants will make their own C-Stunners with cut-shapes, recycled materials, found objects, and other fun art-making materials! 

Dec 8, 2013 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM

Photo: Cyrus Kabiru, Nubian Mask (from the “C-STUNNER” series), 2013

  See more at: http://www.studiomuseum.org/event-calendar/event/hands-2013-12-08#sthash.9jkISQuv.dpuf

[thewrathofkwan]

Shadows Took Shape, Afrofuturism at The Studio Museum of Harlem - Boothism

Shadows Took Shape, a new exhibit at the Studio Museum of Harlem features more than sixty works of art, including ten new commissions, charting the evolution of Afrofuturist tendencies. The exhibit, organized by Assistant Curator Naima J. Keith and independent curator Zoe Whitley, draws its title from an obscure Sun Ra poem and a posthumously released series of recordings.

On Thursday, November 20th the Museum held a panel discussion featuring Naima J. Keith, Zoe Whitley, Alondra Nelson and DJ Spooky.

I couldn’t be there and livetweets are about as close as we can get to teleporting, so I storified the convo here.

[afrofuturistaffair]

The Shadows Took Shape book club discussion centered around Octavia E. Butler's classic novel Kindred will be a robust, interactive concept driven experience. Part conversation, part interactive workshop, there will be overarching thematic presentations, energetic discussion, and audience-driven related activities that are designed to effectively delve into this multi-layered and perennially relevant masterpiece.

Part of the discussion will focus on various aspects of time, memory and agency via the perspective of the protagonist; Dana Franklin. Other themes in the discussion will include analyzing the black body as text and re-imagining Kindred as a Gothic narrative that uses the supernatural to engage with shared historical trauma. Finally, the interactive workshop will focus on the artifacts found scattered throughout the narrative, and participants are encouraged to bring their own, small artifact to include in the workshop. 

[afrofuturistaffair]

In 1998, Alondra Nelson created afrofuturism.net, the pioneering LISTSERV dedicated to facilitating discussions around theories of Afrofuturism, its aesthetic qualities and the politics therein. Soon after, she invited Paul D. Miller aka DJ Spooky, That Subliminal Kid as the first guest moderator. In 2002, she was commissioned to edit an issue of Social Text dedicated to Afrofuturism, igniting an academic interest in science-fiction and fantasy literature and art of the African Diaspora. 

Join the Studio Museum for a panel discussion featuring Naima J. Keith and Zoe Whitley, co-curators of The Shadows Took Shape, Alondra Nelson, Professor of Sociology and Gender Studies at Columbia University and Paul D. Miller as they discuss the scope of how Afrofuturism is understood today, from the novels of Samuel Delany and Nalo Hopkinson and Sun Ra's film Space is the Place (1974) to blogs such as The AfroFuturist Affair and the stylings of recording artist Janelle Monáe

- See more and buy tickets at: http://www.studiomuseum.org/event-calendar/event/the-shadows-took-shape-panel-discussion-2013-11-21#sthash.c9Kz4Iw0.dpuf

Photo from John Akomfrah, Memory Room 451, 1997Courtesy the artist and Carroll / Fletcher, London 

[shadowstookshape]

Jacolby Satterwhite  Model It (performance still), 2012 Photo: Sarah Stuve