May
5
to May 6

Tell me the story Of all these things: Rehana Zaman in conversation with Chandra Frank

Pavilion presents a screening and conversation with artist Rehana Zaman and curator and writer Chandra Frank.

Zaman’s video Tell me the story Of all these things (2016), shown at Tenderpixel, London (2016-2017), explores processes of disassembling as constitutive of lived experience. Drawing together intimate conversations between the artist and her two sisters, ominous animated visions of a metamorphosing body, e-learning training on Prevent, and staged, performed gestures; the work attends to the particular experiences of British Muslim women. Tell me the story Of all these things takes its title from Theresa Hak Kyung Cha’s Dictee, a novel that deploys a variety of texts to examine themes of dislocation and fragmentation.

Dreaming Rivers (1988) directed by Martina Attille (Sankofa Film and Video) is a bittersweet drama reflecting on migration, dislocation and the Windrush Generation. Attille has said that this film ‘illustrates the spirit of modern families touched by the experience of migration,’ as it follows the memories of Caribbean-born Miss T and her family.

The screening is followed by Rehana Zaman in conversation with Chandra Frank, an independent curator, writer and PhD candidate whose work focuses on the Black, Migrant and Refugee women’s movement in the Netherlands during the 1980s.

Friday 5 May 2017, 6–8pm

The Leeds Library, 18 Commercial Street, Leeds

Free entry

Suggested donation £5

Book online at eventbrite.com

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Mar
11
6:00 PM18:00

Can the Archive Speak? Curator Talk with Dr. Ben Cranfield

As part of the Possible Futures project, curator Chandra Frank talks about her curatorial practice, thinking through the changing role of the curator particularly when subjectivity enters the exhibition space.

Drop in to hear about her current project with 198 Contemporary Arts and Learning which continues her research into how queer and feminist archives may function as a vessel for creating different forms of intimacy.

This event is programmed by 198 Contemporary Arts and Learning, a Tate Exchange Associate.

About 198 Contemporary Arts and Learning

198 Contemporary Arts and Learning is a visual arts organisation based in Brixton which boldly pushes the boundaries of creative practice while giving voice to under-represented creative individuals, communities and cultures.

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Opening Exhibition: Fugitive Desires at 198 Contemporary Arts & Learning
Mar
3
to Mar 4

Opening Exhibition: Fugitive Desires at 198 Contemporary Arts & Learning

  • 198 Contemporary Arts & Learning (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Fugitive Desires engages with the archive of 198 Contemporary Arts and Learning looking at what sustains, upholds or restructures our pleasure and desire. As a gallery that transformed from a Caribbean social club, into a to space for local community, young people and artists, the walls of 198 hold the energy of each moment each breath, exhibition, conversation, opening, performance and workshop. Fugitive Desires brings together the work of international and UK based artists, drawing on material from 198’s archive, placing this material next to new work to consider how the use of archives can be not just reflective but also inspire future ways of being.

Fugitive Desires is an ode to the architecture of 198, revisiting the work of artists who have shown in the gallery over the last 28 years, by tracing different forms of connection and kinship within the archives.  In recalling the space of 198 and its potential for becoming, again and again, the works of Raksha Patel, Joy Gregory, Carol Chin, Carloz Madriz and Ben Jones, allude to the poetics of the archive, with subtle reminders of sacred spirituality, (re)turning the gaze, and how desire spills into mundane and everyday objects. There is an intimate remixing of archival images through collage and large-scale drawing in the contemporary works by Cai Zhang and Heidi Sincuba. Both artists respond to the archive through an intimate continuation of what came before by engaging with ideas of the digital relationship to humanness, sexual pleasure, desire and race. Sculptures by Daniella Valz-Gen, Pachamama Nuna (Makeshift Utopia) and Outside-in invite viewers to experience fugitive desires in a material form, through an invitation to intimately engage with the material narrative of the objects.

In the exhibition, both the works referenced in the archives and the contemporary works, rub up against each other, touch each other and bring up tender and restorative connections. Touching here becomes a form of generative labour, inspired by Audre Lorde’s Uses of the Erotic. An urgent labour much needed in this hardening and increasingly racist political climate as Black and Brown people attempt to imagine and reconfigure the connections that sustain and nurture their futures.  To this end in the back gallery, selected video works look into different forms of being, future imaginings, geographies of pleasure, queer desire and loss. Works by Ope Lori, Michele Pearson Clarke, Pratibha Parmar, Tabita Rezaire, Lynnée Denise and FAKA are selected specifically to reflect on future possibilities that emerge from the archive. The desire to feel, to recognise, to connect, and to arrive, are not fixed to a certain time or location, but rather are transient and inspired by Fred Moten’s notion of the fugitive, to re-imagine structures for those who fall without, for the quiet revolutionaries, the feminist killjoys, the tricksters, the sorcerers, the wanderers, and those who plant seeds and harvest to undo the default. 

Fugitive Desires serves as an open invitation to find a temporary home in the fugitive, to re-think and desire what makes us possible, inviting artists and audience to respond, build, disrupt and re-frame the (un)familiar.

 

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Queer Bodies at UAL by Shades of Noir
Feb
15
12:00 PM12:00

Queer Bodies at UAL by Shades of Noir

“Queer black and Brown bodies are under threat. Everyday becomes a battle of survival for queer folks of colour, but our bodies are also under the threat of not surviving history. The history of queerness in Eastern cultures is either erased or has often been misrepresented. Our lives have always been appropriated by mainstream media. It has become a belief that queer bodies of colour are a myth, that queerness is only the result of influences of the Western world, however queer bodies of colour have always existed, if you look closely enough there are traces of them left in art-works and poetry, proving that our ancestors may have experienced the world in a similar way to the way we experience it today. Queer bodies will continue to live in power, but how can we make our mark on history? Can art and activism be a proof of our existence?” - Katy Jalili, Event Lead

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Dec
12
2:00 PM14:00

Talk at Pan African Space Station (PASS) Chimurenga in Amsterdam (OBA)

Straight from Cape Town, this pop-up internet radio station, performance space and research platform will broadcast live from the Amsterdam Public Library 11-15 December. PASS brings together cultural producers and thinkers across disciplines, from Amsterdam and abroad, to interrogate our shared histories. 

The PASS live studio will feature daily programming from 14:00 – 20:00 (CET) 11-15 December, with artists, filmmakers, writers, and musicians whose practices draw from and respond to a variety of contexts: like DJ Orpheu The Wizard, Clarice Gargard, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Vo Trong Nghia, and Neo Muyanga!  In celebration of the Prince Claus Fund's 20th Anniversary, PASS is produced through a collaboration between the Prince Claus Fund, the Amsterdam Fund for the Arts, and Chimurenga.

View the programme here

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Oct
20
8:00 PM20:00

Pushing the Boundaries in Art

What does feminist art practice mean today? 

Since the 1960s especially, women active in the arts field in The Netherlands have been firmly establishing their own subjectivity and forms of expression. As discussions on colonial history and the importance of intersectionality in feminism have become more pressing, a space has emerged in which narratives are challenged and (public) memory is questioned. A new generation of feminist artists and cultural producers, following the archival turn in feminism in the 1990s, are increasingly embracing the archive in art practices. How do they use art as a means to insert themselves in and propose new art historical narratives? In what ways do they appropriate historical narratives to present new perspectives through the arts? What are the institutional barriers they experience within the arts field today, and what role can the institutions themselves play in changing the status quo? 

This evening we enter in dialogue with three women active in the arts field that are claiming their own place in tradition and history. We examine how new perspectives are forged and new subjects are made. 

This event takes place at Atria. Entrance is free, please sign up via www.atria.nl. 

Start program: 20:00

Doors open: 19.30

Drinks from 22:00-23:00

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Speakers: Iris Kensmil, Chandra Frank, Elizabeth Kleinveld

Moderator: Esther Captain

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Oct
11
to Oct 12

Interactive performance: My Tongue Softens on the Other Name

Event in the context of exhibition Re(as)sisting Narratives:

Open and interactive performance where artists, cultural performers and thinkers reflect on Re(as)sisting Narratives through taking inspiration from a poem by Gabeba Baderoon. My Tongue Softens on the Other Name plays with themes of desire, intimacy and healing.

Guests Patricia Kaersenhout, Simone Zeefuik, Barby Asante and Happy Kinyili will bring an intervention, performance or reading to the space. My Tongue Softens On The Other Name invites to rethink how we make sense of space and time within the exhibition space. Through the use of words, art, ritual and performance, new narratives and fragments of past and present are woven into future perspectives.

This event is curated by Chandra Frank and hosted by Framer Framed.

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Oct
8
10:00 AM10:00

Decolonize the Archive at: Zwart Nederland. Tweedaags symposium/festival

Nederland kent in 2016 een hernieuwd interesse in kwesties rondom zwarte identiteit, Nederlands burgerschap en representatie. De discussies hierover zijn voor veel Nederlanders nieuw, met name op het moment dat er een link gelegd wordt met vier eeuwen koloniale geschiedenis. Toch kennen we in Nederland al ruim vijf eeuwen zwarte aanwezigheid.

In dit symposium willen we laten zien hoe de zwarte aanwezigheid in Nederland werd weergegeven in bijvoorbeeld kunst, cultuur en Nederlands erfgoed. Nederlanders zijn opgegroeid met het beeld van Zwarte Piet, maar wat is er nog meer? Hoe worden Zwarte Nederlanders in collecties van musea en culturele instellingen vertegenwoordigd en gerepresenteerd? In hoeverre draagt het culturele domein bij aan een hernieuwd interesse in de zwarte identiteit? En welke rol spelen de Diaspora en migratie?

Zwart Nederland verwijst naar de aanwezigheid, verbeelding en beeldvorming van zwarte aanwezigheid in Nederland en hoe dit is gevisualiseerd en vormgegeven in geschiedenis, beeldende kunst, erfgoed, podiumkunsten en film. Dit evenement vindt plaats op zaterdag 8 en zondag 9 oktober.

Programma: https://www.facebook.com/events/637169409794725/

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May
4
6:00 PM18:00

Panel Discussion Bodies and Borders at Goldsmiths University

Wednesday May 4, Bodies and Borders. A panel discussion looking at the ways that (nation-state) borders address bodies, particularly by drawing on feminist and critical race scholarship. Chaired by Dr Leila Whitley (Konstanz, CFR), with Chandra Frank (Goldsmiths), Goldie Osuri (Warwick), Samah Saleh (Goldsmiths) and Dr. Alyosxa Tudor (SOAS/LSE), 6-7.30, LG01, PSH.

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Mar
5
2:30 PM14:30

Lecture Thinking Towards Decolonial Curatorial Practices at Framer Framed, Amsterdam

On March 8th we celebrate International Women’s Day! We will pair up with Meer dan Muze ("More Than Muse"), a joint initiative in Amsterdam led by Mama Cash, which aims to highlight the creative work of women on March 8th.

Framer Framed presents two exhibitions by female makers, including an opening party and a lecture by Chandra Frank. 

♀ OPENING EXHIBITION AKONA KENQU + COCKTAILS ♀

Time: 18:00

Location: IJzaal (at the Tolhuistuin, near Framer Framed space)

“I don’t worry about things like male dominated whatever’s. […] I sometimes get people saying “Oh I thought a guy photographed this” but then what does that mean? I am always left a bit puzzled because what is it to photograph like a woman or a man?”

Join us for homemade Mimosa cocktails at the opening party of exhibition Society! Society is a collaboration between Framer Framed and Market Photo Workshop (South Africa), and features works by South African photographer Akona Kenqu (b.1987). In her body of work, Kenqu explores the daily lives, identities and roles of skaters in contemporary Johannesburg. Her photographs will be shown throughout the public halls of the Tolhuistuin, surrounding the Framer Framed exhibition space. 

THINKING TOWARDS A DECOLONIAL CURATORIAL PRACTICE

The opening of Society is accompanied by a lecture by Chandra Frank (PhD candidate at Goldsmiths), who is curating a two year project for Framer Framed (Re-(as)sisting Narratives), on the relationship between South Africa and The Netherlands. 

In her lecture, Frank talks about what it might mean to adopt a 'decolonial curatorial approach'. What does decoloniality mean, and is it a useful framework? How can we undo coloniality that is embedded in the existence of the Western museum space? Curating exhibitions in Western countries on the global South is tied up with the politics of memory-making. What are the considerations of a curator presenting works that include the neglected memories of the global South? And who is served in the inclusion of those memories, particularly in Western cultural institutions?

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