Open 10:30–5:00, Tuesday – Saturday
Ekow Eshun In the Black Fantastic Winter Brights – Ideas & Influence/Lecture 4
Wednesday 8th November 7pm Tea, Coffee, Prosecco Reception
7.45pm Lecture, 8.30pm Q + A
After Hours at the Museum
Join us this October and November to hear some of the most interesting voices in the visual arts sphere in Ireland and the UK, as curators, writers and critics present illustrated presentations in a series of four evening lectures, supported by The Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media as part of the Night-Time Economy After Hours at the Museum scheme.
In the Black Fantastic
Published to coincide with the exhibition, for which he was awarded the Curatorial Prize 2023 by the Association for Art History, at the Hayward Gallery, London, the book is an expressive exploration of Black popular culture at its most wildly imaginative, artistically ambitious and politically urgent.
It assembles art and imagery from across the African diaspora that embraces ideas of the mythic and the speculative. It looks at how speculative fictions in Black art and culture are boldly reimagining perspectives on race, gender, identity and the body in the 21st century.
The exhibition (June- September 2022), reimagined myth, science fiction, spiritual traditions and the legacy of Afrofuturism. While some artists disrupt our understanding of the past, others invite us to imagine fantastical futures. In the exhibition, fantasy becomes a zone of creative and cultural liberation and a means of addressing racism and social injustice by conjuring new ways of being in the world.
About:
Ekow Eshun is Chairman of the Fourth Plinth, overseeing the foremost public art programme in the UK, and the former Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London. He is the curator of exhibitions including, most recently, In the Black Fantastic at the Hayward Gallery, London, for which he was awarded the Curatorial Prize 2023 by the Association for Art History, and author of books including Black Gold of the Sun, shortlisted for the Orwell prize, and Africa State of Mind, nominated for the Lucie Photo Book Prize. Described by The Guardian as a ‘cultural polymath’, he is the writer and presenter of documentaries including the BBC film Dark Matter: A History of the Afrofuture and the BBC Radio 4 series White Mischief. He has contributed to books on artists including Mark Bradford, Kehinde Wiley, Chris Ofili, John Akomfrah and Wangechi Mutu and his writing has appeared in publications including the New York Times, Financial Times, The Guardian, The Observer and Wired. He is the recipient of an honorary doctorate from London Metropolitan University.
The Q + A will be moderated by artist Joy Gerrard.
