EXHIBITION ABSTRACT & CONCEPT
The Afro‐Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined
April 23 – November 27, 2022
Palazzo Bembo, Venice, Italy
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ABSTRACT
Future-looking Black artists…are not only reclaiming their right to tell their own stories, but also critique the European/American digerati of their narratives about cultural others, past, present, and future, and challenging their presumed authority to be the sole interpreters of Black lives and Black future.
Reynaldo Anderson
Afrofuturism 2.0 & The Black Speculative Art Movement
In“The Afro-Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined,” African-American artists construct a future forged in transatlantic links and Afrofuturism’s ideology to expand the notion of Blackness at the intersection of technology and liberation. An existence conceived, as asserted by author Kevin Young, in “Elsewhere…the remapping of what’s here,” forming an alternative reality where one’s freedom and humanity is found. A utopian world— at its nucleus, Black lives the dark matter that sustains the universe, and Black activists, creatives, and intellectuals, the heavenly bodies and sustenance of black holes—gives birth to the exploration of the future Time, Space and Existence of Blackness.
The term “Afrofuturism” was coined by American author, lecturer, and cultural critic Mark Dery in 1993. But the concept was conceived in the cosmology and ideology of ancient Africa, transported in the souls of the enslaved, birthed in the Afro-diasporic experience, and preserved through atavistic memory. Dery questioned, “Can a community whose past has been deliberately rubbed out, and whose energies have subsequently been consumed by the search for legible traces of its history, imagine possible futures?”
What Dery failed to realize is the history of Black people has never been “rubbed out.” It has always lived in the art, music, and literature articulated by its people—and existed within the framework of Afrofuturism …with the mission of laying the groundwork for a humanity that is not bound up with the ideals of white Enlightenment universalism. (Jones, 2015, Rabaka, 2010, Rollefson, 2008, p. 91)
“The Afro-Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined” is the response to Dery’s question and affirmation that the “possible futures” of Black people will not only be imagined but realized—rooted in African traditions, composed in its polyrhythms, and storied in the lexicon of the African American experience.
Future-looking artists investigate the intersection of Black culture and 21st century technologies that are, as suggested by Dery, “too often brought to bear on black bodies.” Artists Tawny Chatmon, Larry Cook, Morel Doucet, Monica Ikegwu, M. Scott Johnson, Delita Martin, Arvie Smith, and Felandus Thames employ paintings, prints, sculpture, video, and photography to claim agency over Blackness and envision a world devoid of socio-economic inequalities, the pandemic, and white supremacy.
Drawing inspiration from the philosophical principles of Afrofuturism—black empowerment and liberation—artists present a visual narrative rooted in the nuances of Blackness, which embraces the past, contests the injustices of the present, and serves as a manifesto for the future.
Myrtis Bedolla, Founding Director, Galerie Myrtis
Curator
CITATIONS:
Anderson, Reynaldo. Afrofuturism 2.0 & The Black Speculative Art Movement, Notes on a Manifesto. 2016, pp. 230-231. https://www.academia.edu/30863657/AFROFUTURISM_2_0_and_THE_BLACK_SPECULATIVE_ART_MOVEMENT
Dery, Mark. Black to the Future: Interviews with Samuel R. Delany, Greg Tate, and Tricia Rose. Duke University Press, 1994. pp. 180-185.
Jones, Esther L. Medicine and Ethics in Black Women’s Speculative Fiction. Palgrave Macmillan, 2015.
Rabaka, Reliand. Africana Critical Theory: Reconstructing the Black Racial Tradition, fron WEB Du Bois and CLR James to Frantz Fanon and Amilcar Cabral. Lexington Books, 2010.
Rollefson, J. Griffith. “The Robot Voodoo Power” “Thesis: Afrofuturism and Anti-Anti-Essentialism from Sun Ra to Kool Keith.” Black Music Research Journal, vol.28, no. 1, 2008, pp. 83-109.
Young, Kevin. The Grey Album: On the Blackness of Blackness, Graywolf Press, 2012, p. 53.
EXHIBITION CONCEPT
“The Afro-Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined” asserts Afrofuturism as the cross-cultural philosophy of artists, musicians, and writers who draw inspiration from techno-utopian thinking of the space age to reimagine Black life.
As a cultural aesthetic that combines science-fiction, history, and fantasy, artists will recontextualize the African American experience through an imagined future that aims to link those from the Afro-diaspora.
THEMES
In expanding the notion of Black lives and Black future, varied media and technologies will offer discourse on the historical, political, and societal dimensions of the Black experience through three themes:
Time: Time becomes the metaphor in an investigation of counter-histories that reconsider the role and contributions of African-Americans in shaping Western society. Artists will look to the historical Afro-diasporic past in imagining an alternative future.
Space: Space takes on two forms. The first is manifest in Black consciousness and Afro-futurist philosophy of freedom and self-determination. The second is realized in technology, the vehicle for boundless imagination and the mechanism through which the politics of race and culture are explored.
Existence: Existence of Blackness is presented in an egalitarian society of the future. The progressive and futuristic vision of African-Americans is imagined emancipated from a Eurocentric lens.
EDUCATIONAL COMPONENT
“The Afro-Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined” will bring to the forefront artists, activists, authors, and musicians who have contributed significantly to the development of Afrofuturism. Early practitioners of Afrofuturist theory are artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, activists Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Marcus Garvey, authors Octavia E. Butler, W.E.B. Du Bois, Samuel R. Delany, Frantz Fanon, Ralph Ellison, and musicians such as George Clinton, and Sun Ra. It is through their art, activism, literature, and music that Afrofuturism became a cultural phenomenon.
The exhibition seeks to:
• Recontextualize the Black experience through a futuristic lens.
• Provide insight into the socio-political concerns of the African-American community.
• Celebrate Black culture and pay tribute to the reliance, creativity, ingenuity, and spirituality that have historically sustained Black people.
AUDIENCE
“The Afro-Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined” intends to appeal to an international audience. However, given its focus on the African-American experience, it may be of particular interest to people of the African-diaspora.
The artwork will offer visual aesthetics storied in Black culture to enhance the appreciation and understanding of African-Americans. Artists draw from historical occurrences and present experiences in imaging the future world of Black life.
SUGGESTIONS FOR PROGRAMMING
With the assistance of ECC, the Galerie Myrtis (GM) group (curator and artists) seek to develop programs to provide learning experiences using art as the universal language to educate, bridge communities and cultures, and break down language barriers.
The GM group also plans to offer a series of special activities to engage the Afro-Italian community for cross-cultural experiences, such as, author events, youth programs, lectures, and musical performances.
GM will present programs developed around the themes of time, space, and existence.
1. Photographer Tawny Chatmon will photograph Afro-Italian children. The photographs will serve as a vehicle for discussing identity and cultural pride. Theme: Existence
2. Photographer Larry Cook will collaboration with formerly incarcerated Afro-Italian men practicing photography. Participants will deploy the camera to tell personal stories through traditional portraiture. Themes: Space and Existence
3. Educator M. Scott Johnson will offer a bookmaking session with Afro-Italian teens who will imagine their futures. Themes: Time, Space, and Existence
4. Printmaker Delita Martin will conduct a printmaking workshop with Afro-Italian women who will create narrative works that speak to their spirituality and creativity. Themes: Space and Existence
5. Painter and educator Arvie Smith will work with Afro-Italian incarcerated youth. Participants will learn approaches to pencil and figure drawing. Skills in drawing equip the individual with the means of communication in the universal language of art.