hard ground, liquid blackness
group exhibition at MoMA PS1, new publications, group screening at Walker Art Center, Artists Against Censorship Zine
“We might read Moten's and Ross's respective attention to vessels as calls to consider the status of blackness by what is uncontainable by representation, by what has been denied by its original but perhaps not only form, and by what is perpetually still in the making.”
- Kelly I. Chung; “If Today Never Gives Up In Me”: Amina Ross's Spacious Black Present. liquid blackness 1 April 2024; 8 (1): 102–118.
Hello everyone!
It has been some time, the former home of my mailing list shuttered earlier this year and I’ve now switched over to substack - please bear with me as I figure this new platform out. Thanks for being here.
Body Vessels (3,4,6 & 7) in group exhibition “Hard Ground” at MoMA PS1 [Queens, NY] opening May 16
I arrived at the title “body vessel” as almost a non-thought, a quick shorthand to simply describe these amorphous shapes that I have been loosely basing off of my body. Making these forms has been a way of thinking about a sort of non-human non-person body, a way of finding affinity with matter living and non-living. I use clay and wax to make plaster-silica molds that are only used once. I then fill these molds with powdered glass of varying colors and then they are put in a kiln.
In coming to these forms I am often thinking about my body as a stone or a mountain as my body. I flip back and forth between these forms being something that has come out of me or something that seeks a place in side of me or something else. These forms help me articulate a space where the inside and outside, the internal and external worlds, converge and confuse.
I will be showing some of these forms in hand blown glass dishes with rainwater as a part of the group exhibition “Hard Ground” curated by Jody Graf opening at the end of this month. There is an open house on May 18, free to all ny’ers, hope to see you there.
Transmission shorts program Walker Art Center [Minneapolis, MN] May 11
This weekend, Saturday May 11 my short film “Man’s Country” will be playing a program curated by Jon Davies at The Walker Art Center. Other artists/filmmakers in this program include Mariah Garnett, Theo Jean Cuthand, Jamie Ross & Pauline Boudry / Renate Lorenz. I’m really excited to be a part of what looks like a deeply moving program. From the Walker Art Center website:
Curated by Jon Davies, the Transmission Shorts Program examines experimental film/video works from the past decade that reimagine the possibility of communication, exchange, and intimacy across generational lines. Works consider the erotics of loss and of missing out as well as complicated connections with parental figures—real or fantasized. Others offer models for how to map inaccessible spaces, unbury repressed histories, and how to disappear. Together this collection of shorts exhibit what scholar Carolyn Dinshaw calls a “queer desire for history,” using moving images to viscerally touch across time and its ruptures.
It is impossible to talk about loss, history or queerness without continuing to name the ongoing genocide of Palestinian people, the ongoing assault of the land that is Palestine and the myriad of other man-made crises in Sudan, the Congo and elsewhere. In a recent screening and discussion titled “Queer Ecologies,” alongside artists/ cultural workers J Wortham, Suhaly Bautista-Carolina, Ohan Breiding and Sasha Wortzel we each spoke about our work in relationship to ongoing world crises. During that discussion I prefaced my video, “I am under” 2022, with a five minute introduction to ground us in the work. Here is an excerpt from what I read:
“ We are sitting with the haunting legacies of colonialism and imperialism… My hope is that we can use our pain and grief as gateways/bridges/portals into feeling more deeply into the pain of others and the pain of the world. We can let these feelings change us and move us into greater action.
In this moment I would like to amplify a global ‘shaking off’, a globalized intifada…
I’ll return to the text I read earlier, what I named a choreography for grief perhaps could also be called a score for shaking off - from Toni Morrison: ‘And there must be much rage and saliva in its presence. The body must move and throw itself about, the eyes must roll, the hands should have no peace, and the throat should release all the yearning, despair and outrage that accompany the stupidity of loss.’ - Toni Morrison in Sula p.107”
Transmission Shorts Program curator Jon Davies delves into the relationship between queer histories, moving image practices and this ongoing genocide in Palestine in his deeply moving essay shared on the Walker Art Center’s website:
“we have a trove of accumulated queer knowledge that should make us wary of both the dehumanization of Palestinians and of the widespread censorship of the resulting dissent—to understand what the violence of empire looks like, and to see through the desperate obfuscation taking place. Each of these videos documents crimes against humanity, but no one in them wants a camera in their faces as they pull their child or fragments of their child from the rubble. This is a genre of moving images no one should have to produce or watch. The unbearable pain of their production makes an ethical—and not only political—demand on the world.” - Jon Davies in his essay “Morbid Symptoms”
In response to what this moment calls for, in addition to being in the streets for protests, calling congress and local politicians and acting up in whatever ways possible, I worked as a part of a collaborative group of sweet and steadfast artists to put together this zine: Artists Against Censorship & Repression. Please take a look and spread widely. We are in need of printing assistance in NYC. If you have resources to share, please reach out.
Shout out to the brilliant, kind and fiercely liberation-oriented folks who poured into this zine: Lark (@sirlyra), Imani (@thoughtsandkeys), Nia (@niaeas), Saar (@saardaga), Adrienne (@rockyyoadrienne), Bimbola (@bimbolamakes), Mae (@swamp_witch__) & other unnamed collaborators.
Recent past…
A moment to share and celebrate events and exhibitions recently past:
Group Exhibition Escape Room at University of Virginia Ruffin Gallery. Curated by Marissa Williamson and Kim Bobier
Group Screening and Conversation Queer Ecologies at UnionDocs
Inteview with Ksenia M. Soboleva in BOMB Magazine
Liberation Tarot Deck in-person event at Bluestockings, I facilitated a group reading and would love to do more of that :)
See you soon
xo
Amina