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Closing day: Shawn Theodore “Church of Broken Pieces” at AAMP
On Display: February 2 – April 2, 2017
Shawn Theodore’s Church of Broken Pieces is a photographic exploration of the psychic, physical and technological translocation of black America. Theodore’s photos document the success of the movements toward plural black identities, and free, safe black digital spaces (such as Black Twitter) and futures – even as displacement/gentrification, socioeconomic disparity, and violence threaten to impinge progress.
The work captures and contextualizes emerging black Americans who are working to steady the firmament upon which their communities trod. These depictions weave together the corporeal elements of black neighborhoods in flux to create a visual language which conveys the spirit, rich cultures, histories, and the present course of black life.
Theodore’s approach to Church of Broken Pieces merges his conceptual photography style with influences of African American folk painting for his portraits, and the rich African American tradition of quilt making without departing from his established street photography sensibilities to explore the remaining architecture of the gentrified black neighborhoods. The rich conversation between Theodore and his subjects weaves a narrative between the portraits to tell the story of a contemporary black America in flux; a group that sees themselves repeating patterns visited upon ancestors who lived through the defining eras of Post-Antebellum America, Jim Crow, The Great Migration, the Civil Rights Movement, the so-called ‘war on drugs’ to today’s call to understand that black lives, in fact, matter.
Cost: $14 Adults $10 Seniors