Imagining Black Diasporas: Widline Cadet

Artist Widline Cadet talks about how her art practice is shaped by the idea of diaspora.

 

"Imagining Black Diasporas: 21st-Century Art and Poetics" finds aesthetic connections among 60 artists working in Africa, Europe, and the Americas. The exhibition and its catalogue are among the first to examine nearly a quarter century of production by Black artists. The project debuts new acquisitions for LACMA and expands the Pan-African exhibition canon, historically focused on the Black Atlantic, by showcasing artists working along the Pacific Rim. Nearly 70 works of painting, sculpture, photography, works on paper, and time-based media are organized into four themes: speech and silence, movement and transformation, imagination, and representation. Contemporary poets contributed original work to the catalogue, extending the historical use of poetry in Pan-African discourse. Diaspora’s general definition as a displacement from origins excludes all the creativity the term entails. People reinvent their heritage through artistic expressions, transforming diaspora from regional movement into a wellspring of imagination. Through an analysis of Black artists’ aesthetic choices, Imagining Black Diasporas reveals their insights about existence.

 

For more information about the exhibition, please visit: https://www.lacma.org/art/exhibition/...

Production by Wax & Gold