Liberatory Living: Protective Interiors and Radical Black Joy features designs, artworks, and environments dedicated to the global necessity for Black people to cultivate domestic interiors not only as spaces of revolutionary action, but also of radical joy and revolutionary rest. Conceptually, Liberatory Living evokes bell hooks’ concept of “Homeplace,” or those concrete spaces which inspire that [particular] feeling of safety, arrival, and homecoming—reminiscent of the warmth and belonging she experienced at her grandmother’s home.
In tandem, Elizabeth Alexander’s notion of the “Black interior” unfolds as a space of unlimited imagination—a “Black imaginary” that challenges us to envision what we are not meant to envision and captures themes society often overlooks including complex Black identities; genuine and actionable Black empowerment; and rampant and unfetishized Black beauty.
These two Black feminist frameworks collaborate in Lee’s curatorial idea of spaces crafted to incubate Black Joy, an idea that will be expressed theoretically and materially throughout the exhibition.
Liberatory Living features sixteen contemporary designers and artists whose furnishings, wall coverings, lighting, ceramics, and other atmospherics are brought together to suggest what might be necessary to construct and sustain a sense of safety and belonging, in response to the enduring need for beauty to bolster those sensibilities. The exhibit also blends custom and retail objects, showcasing a broad spectrum of work that reflects a persistent impulse to create spaces offering sensory circumstances for profound relief.
The first exhibition of its kind at Museum of the African Diaspora (MoAD), Liberatory Living: Protective Interiors & Radical Black Joy is an open invitation to deep, communal contemplation of contemporary interior design integral to dismantling destructive colonial legacies and opening spaces of Radical Black Joy without fetishizing Black strength and resilience.
Artists include: Andile Dyalvane, Angela Hennessy, Chantal Hildebrand, Cheryl R. Riley, Chuma Maweni, dach&zephir, Germane D. Barnes, Kapwani Kiwanga, King Houndekpinkou, Lina Iris Viktor, Malene Djenaba Barnett, Michael Bennett, Nandipha Mntambo, Norman Teague, Sandra Githinji Studio, Sheila Bridges, Traci Johnson, Zanele Muholi, Zizipho Poswa
