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Convening Schedule - Register To Attend!
Thursday, July 27th from 6 to 8pm, there will be an opening ceremony at The Colored Girls Museum featuring a performance by Germaine Ingram and keynote by Dr. Omi Osun Jones. Due to space constraints this event is only viewable online. Register on eventbrite to join this event online via zoom here.
Friday the 28th at 2:30pm, Director and Curator, Arielle Julia Brown will introduce the 2021-2022 artist talk featuring process based refections from Awilda Sterling Duprey, Sonja Dumas, Candice D’Meza, AZ Espinoza, Arielle John, Monèt Marshall, nikolai mckenzie ben rema and LaRissa Rogersshared recently at the Black Spatial Relics Artist Retreat streamed on youtube and on zoom. Register on eventbrite here.
Friday the 28th at 5:30pm, Director and Curator Arielle Julia Brown will introduce a virtual series of experimental performances from 2021-2022 artists in residence, Awilda Sterling Duprey, Sonja Dumas, Candice D’Meza, AZ Espinoza, Arielle John, Monèt Marshall, nikolai mckenzie ben rema and LaRissa Rogers. Register on eventbrite for this event on youtube and zoom here.
Saturday the 29th, Abdul-Aliy Muhammad’s dedication to rituals of joy and hope, Black Reverence Chair will tour four locations across the city inviting audiences to engage in affirmations guided by decorated Black artists. This tour is collaboratively presented with generous support from Black Spatial Relics, The Museum of Black Joy and Gran Varies Storytelling Project. Register on eventbrite for one of the ritual sessions here.
Sunday the 30th from 12pm to 2:30pm, the convening will close with a gathering at The Discovery Center featuring an opening invocation by Hollerin Space, a mutual aid think tank speculating structures of support with some facilitated by Arielle Julia Brown and a culminating grief workshop by Julia Mallory. Register to join in-person on eventbrite here.
About Some of the Featured Artists
Omi Osun Joni L. Jones’ work is grounded in Black Feminist principles and theatrical jazz aesthetics. She is an artist/scholar/facilitator whose original performances include sista docta—a critique of academic life; and Sittin’ in a Saucer—a series of readings with audience/witnesses using literature as prompts for engagement. Among her ethnographic works are Searching for Ọ̀ṣun—a performance installation around the Divinity of the River; and Theatrical Jazz: Performance, Àṣẹ, and the Power of the Present Moment (Ohio State University Press, 2015)—a collaborative ethnography focusing on three theatrical jazz visionaries. Her scholarship has appeared in the volumes Blacktino Queer Performance, Teaching Black: The Craft of Teaching on Black Life and Literature, and Tarell Alvin McCraney: Theatre, Performance, and Collaboration; as well as the journals The Drama Review, Theatre Topics, Obsidian, and Theatre Journal. Her most recent publication is “Thank You Kindly” (Feminist Studies, 48 No. 1), a short story that explores the interior life of a nine-year-old Black girl growing up in the suburbs of Chicago. As a facilitator and dramaturg, Omi has worked with theatre artists, community organizers, dancers, university students, visual artists, and work staff in the US, Nigeria, and Brazil. During her 28 years at the University of Texas at Austin, she served as the Director of the Warfield Center for African and African American Studies, and founder of the ISESE Gallery, The Performing Blackness Series, and the Austin Project—a collective of Global Majority women and allies using art to foster personal growth and social change. Omi has been shaped by Robbie McCauley’s activist art, Laurie Carlos’s insistence on being present, and Barbara Ann Teer’s overt union of art and Spirit. She earned her Ph.D. from New York University, and her Embodied Social Justice Certificate from Transformative Change. She is Professor Emerita from the African and African Diaspora Studies Department at the University of Texas at Austin, a mother, a Queer wife, and a curious sojourner.
Germaine Ingram is a jazz tap dancer, choreographer, song writer, and vocal/dance improviser. Her work channels styles and traditions she learned from and performed with legendary Philadelphia hoofer LaVaughn Robinson (1927-2008), her teacher, mentor, and performance partner for more than 25 years. Since her work with Robinson, she has created choreography for national tap companies; performed as a solo artist, and collaborated and performed with noted jazz composers and instrumentalists—including Odean Pope, Dave Burrell, Diane Monroe, Tyrone W. Brown, and Bobby Zankel—— as well as dance artists rooted in diverse genre. Through choreography, music composition, performance, writing, production, oral history projects, and designing and leading artist learning environments, she explores themes related to history, collective memory, and social justice. Her recent performance projects include an evening-length production inspired by the establishment of the African Methodist Episcopal Church in Philadelphia in the late 18th Century; an hour-length performance piece for Atlanta, GA’s 150-year commemoration of the Battle of Atlanta, a turning point in the Civil War; in April 2015, an evening-length production of original music and dance for the VivaDanca International Festival in Salvador, Brazil; and in February 2016, an artist residency, performance, and keynote lecture/performance for Brandeis University’s annual festival of social justice. In 2015/2016, she was a collaborator in a two-year, multi-disciplinary exploration of how art addresses sudden loss of human life. Currently she is the principal designer and a collaborator in a Pew-funded project that excavates the history and evolution of the practice of Yoruba performance traditions and culture in Philadelphia.
Abdul-Aliy A. Muhammad is a Philadelphia born/raised organizer, writer and co-founder of the Black and Brown Workers Co-op. In their work they often problematize medical surveillance, discuss the importance of bodily autonomy and center Blackness. Abdul-Aliy is a co-convener of Finding Ceremony, a descendant community-controlled process, restoring the lineages of care, reverence, and spiritual memory to the work of caring for our dead.
Hollerin’ Space is for dreaming and being. We collectively cull cultural ways, symbols/artifacts and data to generate a happening. We are always dreaming on the social effects of the ever present and evolving energies of the universe. We are interested in the human condition of call/response and intentionally creating while considering the vibratory affect of our work. Black life is a particular lens we focus with that guides our work. Themes we explore include: migration, world building, ancestor devotion, blood memory, Black love, family, Black women visibility, queer embodiment, sensory programming and coding, public life, solidarity economy and gathering.
Julia Mallory is committed to being a good steward of, and vessel for, her ancestors’ stories. As a storyteller, she works across multiple genres with a range of mediums, from text to textiles. As a creative and grief guide, Julia is invested in cultivating care, creativity, and community through a robust workshop facilitation practice. She is a 2023 Diaspora Solidarities Lab Community Fellow and a Spring 2022 Reclamation Ventures Impact Grantee (healing practices for grief).In 2022, as the recipient of the Black Art in America Foundation “The Next Big Idea” grant, Julia founded the Harrisburg Youth Arts Incubator, an experimental artmaking program for young people ages 12-17. She is also the founder of the creative container, Black Mermaids and the author of six books, including two children’s books. In addition, her short film, Grief is the Glitch debuted in 2022.Julia is the mother of three children and is from the Southside of Harrisburg.