HOUSTON: Radical Presence: Black Performance in Contemporary Art



Simone Leigh and Chitra Ganesh, Untitled #1 (From the series “my works, my dreams, must wait till after hell”), 2012. 

Image via camh.org.

November 17, 2012 – February 15, 2013
Opening Reception: Friday, November 16, 2012, 7-9PM

CONTEMPORARY ARTS MUSEUM HOUSTON

5216 Montrose Boulevard

Houston, TX

Radical Presence: Black Performance in Contemporary Art chronicles the persistence of black performance in the field of visual arts.  While black performance has been largely contextualized as an extension of theater, black visual artists have integrated performance into their work for over five decades, generating a repository of performance work that has gone largely unrecognized until now.  Radical Presence provides a critical framework to discuss the history of black performance traditions within the visual arts beginning with the “happenings” of the early 1960s, throughout the 1980s, and into the contemporary practices of a new generation of artists. This exhibition is organized by Senior Curator Valerie Cassel Oliver.

The exhibition will feature work by three generations of artists including Derrick Adams, Terry Adkins, Papo Colo, Jamal Cyrus, Jean-Ulrick Désert, Theaster Gates, Zachary Fabri, Sherman Fleming, Coco Fusco, Girl [Chitra Ganesh + Simone Leigh], David Hammons, Trenton Doyle Hancock, Lyle Ashton Harris, Maren Hassinger, Wayne Hodge, Satch Hoyt, Ulysses S. Jenkins, Shaun El C. Leonardo, Kalup Linzy, Dave McKenzie, Jayson Musson, Senga Nengudi, Tameka Norris, Lorraine O’Grady, Clifford Owens, Benjamin Patterson, Adam Pendleton, Adrian Piper, Pope.L, Rammellzee, Sur Rodney (Sur), Jacolby Satterwhite, Dread Scott, Xaviera Simmons, Danny Tisdale, Carrie Mae Weems, among others.  Radical Presence will feature video and photo documentation of performances, performance installations and relics, as well as ephemera related to the featured performance works.

Exhibit Link