select performances
Call Me Ishmael: A Story of Exploitation, 2019
Commissioned by Hudson Hall in honor of the 200th Anniversary of Herman Melville’s birth in New York
Performed at Second Ward Foundation. Sound Design by Chris Garneau with accompainment by Nkoula Badilia, Movmement by Davon Rainey & Visuals by Rebecca Borrer.
Expanding on the narrative themes of Moby Dick and the start of modern environmentalism, Call Me Ishmael is a collaborative performance piece utilizing poetry, video and sound. This one-woman performance uncovers a historical through line connecting the brutality of the whaling industry, the black migration experience, and the birth of the Save the Whales movement, giving voice to the stories from the frontline of modern-day environmental conditions – those of exploitation, disenfranchisement and convenience.
Limited Edition Broadsheet for Call Me Ishmael
more documentation forthcoming
Curated by the Flow Chart Foundation
Commissioned poem read to 2001: A Space Odyssey
The Flow Chart Foundation is dedicated to exploring the interrelationships of various art forms as guided by the legacy of renowned American poet, John Ashbery. Inspired by “Benshi,” the Japanese performers who provided live narration and cultural translation for audiences in the silent film era, neo-benshi artists take scenes from popular film or television and replace the sound with their own live spoken works. The result is a new kind of multi-media happening that has taken the experimental performance world by storm.
RAGGA NYC: All the threatened and delicious things joining one another
New Museum, 2017
Touched, 2017- commissioned poem for exhibit
& perfomance with musical accompainment by Eliza Douglass & Mounanou Badila
RAGGA connects a community of queer Caribbean artists working across a wide range of disciplines—including visual art, fashion, and poetry—to explore how race, sexuality, gender, heritage, and history inform their work and their lives. A vibrant community deeply committed to education and grassroots organizing, RAGGAfosters a network and an extended family that makes space for solidarity, celebration, and expression. Their residency explores Afro-Caribbean diasporic traditions, bringing together works by a group of artists who trace their own relationships to Caribbean history.
Portland Insitute of Contemporary Art’s TBA Festival, 2016
Tender Reading @ PNCA 511 Gallery
Exploring complex realities of postmodern black womanhood through prose and sculpure.
