In Place of Now

Co-curated by Judie Gilmore, gallery director, and writer and scholar Rone Shavers, In Place of Now showcases both emerging and established artists whose work engages in the politically subversive acts of picturing “otherness,” reinventing the past, and reclaiming the future. These themes are common to Afrofuturism, now nearly 30 years old, but when viewed in today’s hyper-partisan social and cultural spheres, they appear more political and less fantastical, more dystopian than utopian, and surprisingly more about us now, rather than an exploration of the other at any other time. That is to say, given our current political climate, works that include or address notions of estrangement seem more relevant, present, and profound than ever before. Within this context, we are interested in artwork that offers new speculations regarding contemporary black identity and explores issues of blackness, which again seems to be in contention.