Holding Space: Reflections on Children of the Sun
View the recording of this event here.
In her debut solo museum exhibition, Jennifer Mack-Watkins explores history, recalls childhood memories, imagines joy, and acknowledges the importance of positive representation of African Americans. As a printmaker, parent, and educator, Mack-Watkins also shares how she examines her artistic process as a form of resistance against the erasure and invisibility of African American culture. Join Mack-Watkins, Daricia Mia DeMarr of Black Women in Visual Arts, and Novella Ford of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture for a spirited conversation about Children of the Sun, holding space for our own narratives, and what we can learn from the archives.
ADMISSION: Free
Born in Charleston, South Carolina, Jennifer Mack-Watkins lives and works in New York and New Jersey. She earned her B.A. in Studio Art from Morris Brown College, her M.A.T. in Art Education from Tufts University and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and her M.F.A. in Printmaking from the Pratt Institute. Mack-Watkins’s artwork investigates societal conventions that isolate and confine individuals into predefined identities.
Daricia Mia DeMarr is co-founder of Black Women in Visual Arts. She served as assistant director at the NYU Kimmel Center Galleries, curated “Respectfully Yours” at the Queens Museum, Bulova Center, and founded Pi Arts Projects. DeMarr is currently gallery manager at Peg Alston Fine Arts and serves as an independent curator, arts administrator, and consultant.
Novella Ford is the Associate Director of Public Programs and Exhibitions at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, a research division of The New York Public Library. She connects diverse audiences to the archives and engages history through dialogue, performance, literature, and visual arts.
