Pop-Up Exhibition Black Protest - Amerika Haus Berlin · Decoding Basquiat: Protest & Art by Sophie...

Black ProtestPop-Up Exhibition

Black Protest Pop-Up Exhibitionan introductionIntroduction by Bärbel, Ernie & Penelope.

Black Protest Pop-Up Exhibitionan introduction

We are a group of students, all majoring in American Studies at LMU Munich's Amerika-Institut, who wanted to explore the history of African American protest in the United States of America. Collectively, we organized a pop-up exhibition on black protest lasting from the 19th-21th of July at the Amerikahaus in Munich. In total over 30 students worked on this exhibition, since the winter semester of 2016. For us, it was important to know that the Civil Rights Movement is not a closed chapter in US-History, but is a continuous struggle to fight for equality, or, as Angela Davis put it: „Freedom is a constant struggle“. We’ve examined underrepresented activists, analyzed art and music of protest, as well as iconic images of African American resistance. We’ve scrutinized different forms of protest and leadership, and explored the use of and representations in various media. Enjoy this visual summary of our exhibition!

Black Protest Pop-Up ExhibitionProgram, July 19 - July 21 2017

Wednesday, July 19

5 P.M. EXHIBITION OPENING & WELCOME

Andrea Pavlovski & Maresa Sedlmeir (LMU Munich)

Dr. Meike Zwingenberger (Amerikahaus)

Ernest Butler M.A. (LMU Munich)

5.30 P.M. STUDENT-LED TOURS

“Making History – Iconic Photographs and the Media” by Stephanie Matthias

“Butler on Butler: A Son‘s Recollections” by Niall Conn

“Identity & Art: Romare Bearden & Kehinde Wiley” by Alicia Flores Klute

“Decoding Basquiat: Protest & Art” by Sophie Kronfellner

“Slave Resistance: An Art Project” by Juliane Grimme

7 P.M.

Introduction to the Documentary

“I Am Not Your Negro” by Amelie Starke

Screening of Raoul Peck’s

Award-Winning 2016 Documentary

“I Am Not Your Negro”

Thursday, July 20

5 P.M. DOORS OPEN


“From the Raised Fist to the Bended Knee

“Black Protest in Sports” by Simona Glasl & Dominique Hördegen

“African American Servicemen in the US Military

“Oral History Project” by Isabel Spoerl & Julian Mühlfellner

“Policing the Police: (Counter)Surveillance of Black Protest Movements” by Gizem Tosun

“We Are Not Thugs’

“Black Lives Matter Activism in New York“ by Constanze Sabathil

7. P.M. PANEL DISCUSSION

“Black Protest from the Civil Rights Movement Until Today”

with Luvena Kopp (University of Tübingen), Modupe Laja (Panafrikanismus e.V.),Constanze Sabathil (LMU München) & Ron Williams (Actor, Singer, Activist)

moderated by Lukas Schauermann

Reception after panel discussion.

Black Protest Pop-Up ExhibitionProgram, July 19 until July 21

Friday, July 21

5 P.M. DOORS OPEN


“The Unknown Faces of Black Protest”

by Katharina Engels & Maresa Sedlmeir

“Stars for Freedom: Celebrity Support of Black Protest” by Lukas Schauermann

“That Shit Ain‘t Funny – Humor & Protest” by Daniel Deutschle, Laurin Dotzer, Rabea Heckmann & Elisabeth Putz

“The Sound of Black Protest – Music & Resistance” by Julia Thaller

7. P.M. POETRY & MUSIC PERFORMANCES

Modupe Laja

Maron Gebeyehu & Myriam Liebl

Mireille Tsibangu

Modupe Laja

JAZ_and_U

Ray Moore

Renard Yearby

moderated by Joyce Osagie

LIVE MUSIC:

Mel Canady & Chessboard

Exhibition Space

At the Black Protest Pop Up Exhibition the visitors had the opportunity to use an Audio Guide, which led them through the exhibition and each individual student project. The Audio Guide gave interesting background knowledge and additional information on the exhibits and projects so that the visitors were able to experience the whole exhibition in depth. It definitely was one of the highlights of the exhibition and the visitors enjoyed this special feature very much.

Black Protest Pop-Up ExhibitionAudio Guides

Black Protest Pop-Up ExhibitionDAY 1

Making History – Iconic Photographs and the Media

by Stephanie Matthias

For the project “Making History – Iconic Photographs and the Media”, Stephanie Matthias picked out four iconic photographs of Black Protest from the 1950’s until today. She included an image from the Little Rock Desegregation, the Birmingham Campaign, the Ferguson riots, and the protest against police brutality in Baton Rouge. For her project she put together a presentation with the pictures and a detailed description and explanation of each, to give the viewer an understanding how the photographs influenced the way the events were seen at the time they were shot, and how they are seen today. “Photographs play a significant part in making history, also in Black Protest”, as Stephanie herself states it.


Butler on Butler: A Son’s Recollections

by Niall Conn

Ernest Butler took over a decisive role in the Black Protest Exhibition as he mentored the students in their individual projects and provided a lot of inspirations through the stories he told them about his life experiences. Hence, it is no surprise that he himself became the center of one of the student projects. Niall Conn focused in his project on the stories Ernest told him about his father, a local civil rights leader in Indiana. He recorded an interview with Ernest and created a presentation with pictures of Ernest’s childhood and memories and under laid them with the recorded stories of him. “Ernie has such a way with words, and he has such a depth of experiences that, I feel, people would benefit from hearing it” as Niall Conn states on his project.


Identity & Art: Romare Bearden & Kehinde Wiley

by Alicia Flores Klute

Alicia Flores Klute put two different artists in contrast in her project, who have produced art in two totally different time frames. Both had individual influences in expressing African-American identity through their art. Romare Bearden, an artist from the 1960s, tried to present his identity through focusing on themes of music, whereas the contemporary artist Kehinde Wiley presents his identity through historic paintings, in which he reinvents portraits in his own significant way. Alicia Flores Klute especially wanted to emphasize with her project in which ways the contrasting artists deal with the importance of being African-American. She says: “It was interesting to develop the project about two men who come from two totally different time frames.”


Decoding Basquiat: Protest & Art

by Sophie Kronfellner

Basquiat’s artworks feature political, historical, and social references, often commemorating African-American history and protecting the social and political situation of Blacks in the United States. Sophie Kronfellner depicts in her project two paintings of Basquiat, “Hollywood Africans” and “Jesse”. In preparation for the exhibition she analyzed critical elements and decoded them by interpreting references. She provided her results in printed descriptions, placed besides the art pieces and in an even more detailed version on the audio guide of the exhibition. In that way she provided the viewer with in-depth information about her project. In her presentation she pointed out: “The more I was working on this project, the more I was fascinated by Basquiat and his style of painting.”


Slave Resistance: An Art Project

by Juliane Grimme

Juliane Grimme herself took over the role of the artist in her project and painted four unique artworks. Her pictures show an early form of Black Protest as she depicts different forms of slave resistance. Her pictures bear the names “Breaking Tool”, “Poisoning”, “Setting Fire” and “Running Away”. The titles and the depicted deeds on her paintings already indicate the different forms of resistance slaves put forth. With her project Juliane shows the very beginning of Black Protest in North America and as she herself emphasizes: “I think this part of Black resistance is underestimated very often and I think we should not forget that the slaves already took a heavy risk to show resistance to white oppression.”


The screening of “I Am Not Your Negro”, the documentary by Raoul Peck from 2016, was chosen for the first evening event of the Black Protest Exhibition on Wednesday Night. The documentary is based on James Baldwin’s unfinished manuscript “Remember This House” and depicts how Baldwin perceived the time of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States and his encounters with the three famous Civil Rights leaders Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and Medgar Evers.

Before the screening, Amelie Starke introduced the writer and intellectual James Baldwin to the audience and provided an extensive overview about who this important person really was and why he got forgotten over the years. The presentation emphasized the importance of James Baldwin’s words that did not only suit the time of the Civil Rights Movement but also the circumstances in the US today and the current Black Live Matter Movement. As she pointed it out in her presentation: “James Baldwin’s words always mattered and still matter as he identified a problem that did not only exist back in the days but that still is present today – Racism.”

James Baldwin:

An Introduction.

“I Am Not Your Negro”

by Amelie Starke

DAY 1: Highlights


From the Raised Fist to the Bended Knee: Black Protest in Sports

by Simona Glasl & Dominique Hördegen

To illustrate protest in the sports sphere this project introduces three different black athletes from the 1960’s until today. The chosen athletes Muhammad Ali, Tommie Smith and Colin Kaepernick all raised awareness for the continuous oppression of African-Americans, as well as police brutality. Simona and Dominique enjoyed the creative freedom they had during this project, and visualized their findings on a big poster board as well as life-sized cardboard cut-outs of the athletes


African American Servicemen in the US Military – Oral History Project

by Isabel Spoerl & Julian Mühlfellner

Since the engagement of African-Americans in the US Military has always played an important role in fueling the Civil Rights Movement, Isabel and Julian decided to conduct interviews with African-American servicemen. They interviewed five ex-US Army servicemen in an effort to gain an understanding of their experiences in the civil rights engagement. The two interviewers were surprised by how profoundly different the interviewees perceived their time in the military - some saying that they didn't experience any discrimination whatsoever, others recalling grave threats to their physical well-being.


Policing the Police: (Counter)Surveillance of Black Protest Movements

by Gizem Tosun

This project covers the historical background of the Black Protest Movements, such as the Black Panther Party or today’s Black-Lives-Matter Movement. It sets up definitions of surveillance which show how people, especially African-Americans, start to succeed in terms of policing the police. In today’s “Surveillance-Culture” society this is a very relevant topic. Gizem enjoyed deepening her knowledge on Countersurveillance, which she initially learned about in a seminar.


‘We Are Not Thugs’ – Black Lives Matter Activism in New York

by Constanze Sabathil

This project is especially remarkable since Constanze Sabathil traveled to New York to conduct an interview within the scope of the research for her MA thesis about the origin and the development of the Black Lives Matter Movement. She video-taped the interview with Hawk Newsome, President of Black Lives Matter of Greater New York, who gave interesting insights on this particular chapter of the Movement. Since the Movement has seen an increased need for activity and organizing, this interview presented a particularly unique opportunity to tell one of the many stories of Black Lives Matter.


Black Protest: A Poster Project

by Nina Beck, Alicia Flores Klute, Juliane Grimme, Sophie Kronfellner, Stephanie Matthias & Julia Thaller

This work group wanted to transfer the Black Protest spirit with inspirational quotes by activists and celebrities printed on posters, which were placed outside the exhibition to lead towards the entrance. Additionally, they looked up significant data on current injustice on black citizens in the US, which was then printed on posters and spread inside the exhibition’s location. Lastly, research-based definitions of terms, often used in context with racism, were printed on another set of posters. The group especially liked the idea of providing decorative and visual part of the exhibition and creativity played a significant role for them.

Black Protest Pop-Up ExhibitionEvening Event: Panel Discussion

On Thursday evening the panel discussion started around 7 p.m., right after some impressive student-led tours. The chosen principle topic was “Black Protest from the Civil Rights Movement Until Today”, which was discussed by four guests as well as the moderator Lukas Schauermann. The panel members were Luvena Kopp (University of Tübingen), Modupe Laja (Panafrikanismus e.V.), Constanze Sabathil (LMU München) and Ron Williams (Actor, Singer, Activist). They started a lively and inspiring discussion on topics varying from the Black-Lives-Matter Movement to differences between post-racism and post-raciality, as well as the everyday problems African-Americans face in the U.S. and Germany. The panel discussion was followed by a reception, during

which many visitors further debated the earlier brought up subjects.

DAY 2: Highlights


The Unknown Faces of Black Protest

by Katharina Engels & Maresa Sedlmeir

What links Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Malcolm X to each other? The answer is simple and quite obvious: The Civil Rights Movement. However, there are several activists that were and are just as important as those three prominent figures. Katharina Engels and Maresa Sedlmeir wanted to highlight the achievements of unknown activists, who were no longer willing to accept social exclusion and harassment of Blacks. Therefore, starting from the 1950s and leading up to today, each decade depicts the lives of rather unknown Civil Rights activists.


Stars for Freedom: Celebrity Support of Black Protest

by Lukas Schauermann

Stars for Freedom is about the past and present celebrity supporters of Black Protest such as Beyoncé: singer, mother, and wife but also at the forefront of black feminism. She even gets credit by scholars for pushing the issue into the mainstream. However, celebrity support of Black Protest has been an ongoing subject ever since Black Protest started. Martin Luther King Jr. already highlighted the most active ones out of the Stars for Freedom as the leading six. While Lukas did his research, he realized that today’s activism of celebrity supporters is more subtle than it was in the 1950s or 1960s. So he decided to draw a comparison between that era and today. Since a lot of the activism is connected to their creative output he decided to make a video essay.


That Shit Ain‘t Funny – Humor & Protest

by Daniel Deutschle, Laurin Dotzer, Rabea Heckmann & Elisabeth Putz

Minstrel shows, racist jokes made by Whites? Sounds familiar? Well, this project depicts the development of Black humor as we know it today from its roots in slavery and minstrelsy, and focuses on its use as protest. It also shows that Blacks needed an outlet from all the hate and superiority thrown at them. It seems like there were only two options: “Make fun of it yourself or drown in sorrow and pain”.


Music and protest have a long history and it is very interesting to look at the circumstances out of which songs evolved and how the artist’s approach to protest differed. It is also very interesting to look at how music can mirror a moment in history and how it can affect the listener. This project analyzes four songs from different points of time in the struggle for African Americans’ equal rights. Julia explains what hides behind the lyrics of Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit”, Sam Cooke’s “A Change is Gonna Come”, Nina Simone’s “Mississippi Goddam”, and Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On”. However, the real struggle for Julia was to only pick four songs since there is such an enormous amount of protest songs out there.

The Sound of Black Protest – Music & Resistance

by Julia Thaller


Black Protest: A Timeline Project

by Hannah Eismann, Selina Lohr, Clara Münch & Stephanie Schwabe

The Timeline shows significant events in the history of Black Protest starting in 1831 with the Nat Turner Rebellion and ending with Michael Brown and the Black-Lives-Matter Movement in 2014 It includes political and cultural topics, as well as protest movements. By dealing with a specific subject over a longer period of time, the group was able to acquire a lot of knowledge in the range of African American resistance. For them, it was especially interesting to see how all events built up on one another and repeated themselves in the course of history.


Just before the exhibition would come to an end, the visitors could lean back and enjoy a nice evening listening to several poems and music performances. First, Modupe Laja showed us that the problem of racism is not only a problem in the United States but in Germany as well. Following on a lighter note Mel Canady and the band “Chessboard” performed musical pieces on stage. The American actor and singer, Ron Williams, even joined them for a few songs.Next, Maron Gebeyehu & Myriam Liebl performed two songs, followed by JAZ_and_U, Ray Moore, and Renard Yearby, who introduced their own poetry. Here, Ray Moore did not only perform a rap poem, he also entertained the audience with an impromptu freestyle rap. Since he is a poet who paints, he furthermore lent us one of his impressive paintings for the exhibition. All in all, it was the perfect way to end this exhibition!

Poetry and Music Performances

DAY 3: Highlights

Participants & Creators of the Exhibition

Video’s of the Exhibition

You can find two interviews and a video summary of the entire exhibition on YouTube.

The interview with Luvena Kopp, a research fellow in the American Studies Department at the University of Tübingen as well as participant of our panel discussion, is available here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Lvp7cCYzsw&t=9s

Video’s of the ExhibitionRon Williams who is a singer, actor and entertainer, kindly agreed to an interview too, which is available here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mny-oh9deSk&t=95s

You can find a video summary and recap of all three days of the exhibition here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gh6L2nB-t8&t=9s

Credits

Summary created by:Andrea Pavlovski, Alina Schraud and Amelie Starke

Photos provided by: Ricardo Singh

We want to particularly thank our lecturers Ernest Butler, Dr. Bärbel Harju and Penelope Kemekenidou for their continuous commitment.

Pop-Up Exhibition Black Protest - Amerika Haus Berlin · Decoding Basquiat: Protest & Art by Sophie...

Documents

Transcript of Pop-Up Exhibition Black Protest - Amerika Haus Berlin · Decoding Basquiat: Protest & Art by Sophie...