Driskell Center hosts lecture about Black death and liberation
Podium and title of lecture (Alexa Henry/The Black Explosion).
The David C. Driskell Center for the Study of Visual Arts and Culture of African Americans and the African Diaspora held its first event of the academic year, an author lecture on Black liberation movements, on Nov. 16.
The event was by Sampada Aranke, associate professor of history of art and comparative studies at Ohio State University. Aranke discussed her book, “Death’s Futurity: The Visual Life of Black Power,” which highlights groups like the Black Panthers, movement leaders and how their life and death impacted society. The center was previously closed for renovations but opened before the end of the semester for its first event.
“This book argues for continued attention to the ephemera that circulated in the wake of three spectacular murders of Black Panther Party members between 1968 and 1971. Each chapter carries one object made in response to one murder in order to operate in a series of publications in terms of the centrality of death,” said Aranke.
Sampada Aranke, associate professor of history of art and comparative studies at Ohio State University (Alexa Henry/The Black Explosion).
Aranke’s book highlighted Black Panther leader Fred Hampton and a documentary that followed his death in 1971. She focused the lecture on “Blood in My Eye” author George Jackson’s death on August 21, 1970. He died from being shot by a sniper whilst attempting to escape San Quentin State Prison in California.
“During his time inside, Jackson engaged in rigorous study of political, economic theories and social movements that ignited his own politicization, which eventually led to his membership to the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense,” She added that Jackson was responsible for multiracial coalitions engaged in revolution warfare against capitalism.
Aranke began her research into his death and how it affected society by examining a gun found with his body. In spite of her research, she said there is no explanation for how Jackson acquired a gun in one of the country’s most militarized prisons. Aranke added that archives left her inconclusive and there was seemingly no witness or recorded account of Jackson’s murder.
“The only official state document I could access from Jackson was that same four page inventory of clothes left in Jackson’s cell,” she said.
“Power to The People George” by Rafael Morante
She also looked at political artwork made by Rafael Morante titled “Power to the People, George.”
The artwork, she said, provided insight into how Jackson’s death impacted society. She said that Jackson’s body is in silhouette to show a particular history of anti-Blackness.
“Jackson’s figure becomes an open space of identification during anti-Black violence and therefore enables this notion of subjectivity that historically engages with the histories of lynching,” she explained.
She said that his figure is purposely disproportionate in scale which represented that feet were the vessels enslaved people used to achieve liberation. Jackson’s body becomes political in this sense of the work, she said.
“Jackson refers to the head and heart as two as the twofold structure of the revolutionary response, which requires the activation of the rational,” she said.
Making a Mark wall in Driskell Center (Alexa Henry/ The Black Explosion).