Lyle Ashton Harris and Kia LaBeija

On Friday, May 7, 2021 at 2pm, Salon 94 hosts Lyle Ashton Harris and Kia LaBeija for a virtual conversation honoring The Vision & Justice Project and the pivotal impact of BIPOC and LGBTQ+ artists in envisioning and realizing a more equitable future. Using portraiture (of self and others) and performativity, Harris and LaBeija have each demonstrated the exemplary role of contemporary art to explore the relationship between identity, race and power by complicating narratives of representation.

This talk is part of a series honoring the Vision & Justice Project and Sarah Elizabeth Lewis, Associate Professor at Harvard University, organized by Frieze New York. The Vision & Justice Project is dedicated to examining art’s central role in understanding the relationship between race and citizenship in the United States. Rooted in the prescient thinking of Frederick Douglass, and his 1861 speech ‘Pictures & Progress’, the project wrestles with the urgent question of how, in a democracy, the foundational right of representation and the right to be recognized justly, has historically—and is still—tied to the work of visual representation in the public realm. This work helps us to expand our visual literacy which in turn could alter the lens through which we see the world. We are pleased to be in support of this research and endeavor, and to be actively involved in this conversation through this dialogue. For more information please visit www.visionandjustice.org.

Please click here to register.