i am black addresses the experience of being one-of-few people of color in the context of experimental performance. Too often, well-meaning white people fail to recognize how they are entirely complicit in the disavowals that craft Black rage. They imagine social circumstance as a somehow “natural occurrence” and become satisfied by witnessing Black creativity as difference. The terms of white privilege allow for this detachment, as if we were not all incredibly traumatized by the deeds of racist and greedy ancestors.  

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This solo meditation features SLIPPAGE Artistic Director Thomas F. DeFrantz and is free and open to the public. Masking and other safety protocols in place. Please contact 847-491-1495 or sdickson@northwestern.edu for more information.

MORE ABOUT THE PERFORMANCE:

i am black is the first of three works in the Talking|Dance series, co-commissioned by the American Realness festival and Theater Magazine. These performances were conceived to be alongside the Reckoning with Racism in the American South research series at Duke University and have been performed internationally over last few years (with 2022 fall performances scheduled in Canada).  Alongside the other two works in the Talking|Dance series, WHITE PRIVILEGE (2018) and SOUNDZ IN THE BACK OF MY HEAD (2020), i am black series deals with Black creativity and experimental artmaking, the conditions of white supremacy in systems of professional artmaking; and the terms of pre-acceleration and everyday racisms that undergird algorithmic design and AI modeling.    

The performances are free and open to the public.  There will be capacity limits and masking protocols.