Kickin' the Can

Group exhibition presented by ACRE Projects
May 6-28, 2022, Drama Club Gallery, Chicago
Curatorial Team: Anisa Olufemi + R. Treshawn Williamson

From the curators:

Kickin’ The Can explores the magic of play time, day dreams, and slow strolls — simply passing the time and doing so with pleasure. Positioned within the Black American dreamscape, this group exhibition contemplates the restorative nature of pastimes and play grounds that exist beyond pathways that mark the pursuit of capital, exploring the jubilance and romantics of Black leisure. The participating artists include Jada-Amina, Jermaine Jet Carter, Ayana Zaire Cotton, Kenyssa Evans, Janelle Ayana Miller, Shala Miller, Breanna Robinson, Sydney Elexis Vernon, and R. Treshawn Williamson.

In conversation, each work offers a dreamscape for making new friends and choosing your adventure. Video installations, cyanotypes, and screenprints frolick hand in hand, toying with ease and ecstatics, deploying playful poetics that illuminate the many dramas of Black being outside — and in the elsewhere.

else·where: embedded within the everyday delights of double dutch, the erotics of morning dew kissed grass between toes, the wonders of watching airplanes fly over from a swing set, the urgency of freeze tag or two best friends chasing down golden hour in search of a fabled stream bank, hidden somewhere between this place and the next.