Book Launch Reshaping the Field: Arts of the African Diasporas on Display with Languid Hands & Nana Adusei-Poku

Book Tickets

Join us on Thursday 15 June 5.30-7.30pm for the launch of Afterall’s newest Exhibition Histories publication Reshaping the Field: Arts of the African Diasporas on Display at the Stuart Hall Library. There will be brief introductions to the texts from editor Nana Adusei-Poku and artist collective Languid Hands (Rabz Lansiquot & Imani Mason Jordan).

The thirteenth title in the series, Reshaping the Field: Arts of the African Diaspora on Display explores key moments that have created ruptures in how Blackness has been framed through exhibitions, emphasising how Black artists have been viewed and African diasporic art histories have been shaped.

The publication will be available to buy alongside other Afterall works and specially paired with iniva’s publications for a special launch discount. Refreshments served from 5.30pm and chance to see our current exhibition Can publications be porous? co-curated by Lauren Craig.

For more information contact Jenny Starr, jstarr@iniva.org

Speakers

Languid Hands is a London-based artistic and curatorial collaboration between Rabz Lansiquot, a filmmaker, curator, and DJ, and Imani Robinson, writer, live art practitioner, and prison abolitionist. Their work is informed by ongoing explorations in Black and queer studies, Black creative practice, Black liberatory praxis and queer methodologies.

Nana Adusei-Poku is an Assistant Professor in the History or Art and African American Studies Department at Yale University. She was prior Assistant Professor in African Diasporic Art History in the Department of History of Art at the University of California Berkeley. She was previously Associate Professor and Luma Foundation Fellow at the Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York (2019-2022), and Visiting Professor in Art History of the African Diaspora at The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in New York City (2018-2019). The question “What are the conditions of our existence”, which Stuart Hall asked, remains core to her journey and inspires her to embody and develop an engaged pedagogical approach and to explore the performativity of nothingness and life “in the hold”. Her research on Cultural Shifts and how they articulate themselves through the intersections of Art, Politics, and Popular Culture; Artistic productions from the Black Diasporas, and curatorial practice as a research tool to shape art historical discourses.

Publisher

Afterall is a Research Centre of University of the Arts London, located at Central Saint Martins. Afterall focuses its research activities on the value of contemporary art and its relation to wider society. Its specialist research areas include ‘Art Becoming Public’, which addresses exhibitions, institutions and what happens when art becomes public and ‘The Work of Art’, which focuses on researching through the work of art, while interrogating the scope and parameters of this commitment. The research centre works with partners across three continents to deepen this enquiry and make it available through publications, digital access, conferences, screenings and talks.