BL CK B X: Alberta Whittle
accumulating gestures: from the forest to the concrete (to the forest)

On Wednesday 6 November, 9-10.30am, join us for a Breakfast Opening, our special viewing of the exhibition with the artist. Tea, coffee and pastries will be provided. All welcome drop in anytime between 9am – 10.30 am.

LUX is proud to present accumulating gestures: from the forest to the concrete (to the forest), an exhibition with artist, researcher and educator Alberta Whittle, featuring the London premiere of the 2018/19 Margaret Tait Award commission between a whisper and a cry, and from the forest to the concrete (to the forest), produced for Whittle’s recent solo show at Dundee Contemporary Arts (DCA). In these powerful new works, Whittle reflects on the legacies of slavery, colonialism, and the current climate crisis.

between a whisper and a cry seeks to challenge conditions of racialised abjection and find new methods for refusal. A chief linkage in this refusal is the sonic cosmologies found in Kamau Brathwaite’s research on tidalectics and Christina Sharpe’s work on ‘the weather’. Sharpe positions ‘the weather’ as a lens to understand the inescapable conditions within the afterlife of slavery, while Brathwaite’s theories of tidalectics expose the performativity of sound, revealing memories of transoceanic life. between a whisper and a cry speaks of memory, trauma, tensions between the land, the sea and the weather, which reveal the precarity and privilege of geography.

“[between a whisper and a cry] looks at forms of decolonialisation and the climate-related devastation that is accelerating in the Global South with the hurricane seasons getting so much longer, flooding, cyclones and earthquakes becoming more drastic, and even in the UK heatwaves happening in February,” explains Whittle in an interview on Africanah.org. “Linking this extreme havoc of climate change with colonialism and borders feels very pressing in my work, making me wonder how relationships with borders may become even more tense, because essentially the Global South is already dealing with climate change because they are the vanguard, experiencing catastrophe before the West.”

The Barbadian-Scottish artist recently completed from the forest to the concrete (to the forest) for her first major solo exhibition in the UK, How Flexible Can We Make the Mouth, at DCA. In the film, made right after hurricane Dorian wreaked havoc on several Caribbean countries, Whittle continues her reflection on extreme weather and inequality, mourning the loss suffered by communities across the Caribbean.

Whittle’s research involves performance, writing, digital collage, and video installation. Her practice is motivated by the desire to work collectively towards radical self-love, which she considers a key method in decolonization for people of colour to battle anti-blackness.

The exhibition accumulating gestures: from the forest to the concrete (to the forest) is organised and curated by LUX Scotland.

Events related to the exhibition will take place at LUX (Waterlow Park Centre). More to be announced on lux.org.uk/whats-on