The JSMA at PSU is pleased to present “Atlantica: Speculative Fiction and Black Opulence,” a talk with Weaving Data featured artist April Bey. The talk will explore Atlantica, a world imagined by Bey as a critical endeavor into Afrofuturist texts and speculative fiction. Bey’s new body of work continues to broaden her unique vision for an ecosystem of mutual aid and acts of reparation. The artist’s expansive world-building—as an intentional decolonial practice—champions Black subjects as the sole representations of opulence, self-care and pleasure, telegraphed through the harmonization of diverse mediums and materials, including sequins, eco fur, and wax fabric.

Bey grew up in The Bahamas (New Providence) and now resides and works in Los Angeles, CA as a visual artist and art educator. Bey’s interdisciplinary artwork is an introspective and social critique of American and Bahamian culture, feminism, generational theory, social media, AfroFuturism, AfroSurrealism, post-colonialism and constructs of race within supremacist systems.

RSVP Here: http://bit.ly/3GzLvgG

This program is free and open to the public. ASL interpreting will be provided.*

Exhibition, education, and outreach programs have been made possible by a grant from The Ford Family Foundation. This exhibition is supported by the Oregon Cultural Trust.

*Accessibility initiatives have been made possible by a grant from the Richard & Helen Phillips Charitable Fund to the JSMA Community Access Fund.

Image: April Bey, I Was Just An Alien That Came Down From The Sky to Save Your Dumb Behind, 2022, digitally printed and woven blanket with hand-sewn "African" Chinese knockoff wax fabric, 80 x 60 inches, © April Bey, Courtesy of the artist and GAVLAK Los Angeles | Palm Beach