(Dis)Appearing Act Symposium
(Dis)Appearing Act: Visualizing Enslavement and Resistance in Acts of Flight is a symposium complementing the (Dis)Appearing Act exhibition. In an effort to extend conversations on visuality, slavery, and race in the United States, this symposium acknowledges runaway advertisements as visualization technologies and examines the acts of flight conducted by Black people who were forced into slavery. This intimate symposium gathers a multi-disciplinary cohort of graduate students and an undergraduate student artist at Cornell University to expand what we can learn about the experiences of the enslaved and outline the significance of visuality as a tool for domination and liberation in slavery.
(Dis)Appearing Act Exhibition
This exhibit features the soft sculptures of Havily Nwakuche (‘25), which were produced as creative responses to two runaway advertisements in Cornell University’s Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections. Through her use of color, texture, and shape, Nwakuche’s conceptual portraits present the viewer with an artistic archival intervention that interrogates the visualization of enslaved women in the 19th century.
Symposium Speakers:
Chanté Morris (PhD student, Literatures in English)
Claiming Femininity in (Un)gendering Vestibules
Mariah Thompson (PhD student, Africana Studies)
Uncovering the History of John W. Jones
Havily Nwakuche (Fine Arts, Featured artist of (Dis)Appearing Act exhibition)
Words from the Artist
Kimiyo Bremer (PhD student, History of Art and Visual Studies)
Rethinking the Visual Possibilities of the Runaway Ad
Event details:
Symposium:
Thursday, April 27, 2023
4:30-6:00pm
Goldwin Smith Hall, room G22
Reception:
Thursday, April 27th
6:15-7:45 pm
Ruth Woolsey Findley History of Art Gallery, Goldwin Smith Hall
