STUDIO ARTS COLLEGE INTERNATIONAL
The Recovery Plan Conversation Series
Studio Arts College International (SACI) is delighted to announce The Recovery Plan Conversation Series: African Diasporic reflections rooted in Italy. Offered by Black History Month Florence (BHMF) and developed and moderated by SACI project leader and BHMF co-founder, Justin Randolph Thompson in collaboration with Museo MAGA Gallarate near Milan and with SACI, this 6 part series of critical conversations explores Afro-descendent perspectives on Italy through the partnering of 5 under-35 Afro-descendent artists living in Italy alongside 5 Afro-descendent Italian based scholars. Each paring of artist and scholar is established, in each instance, through a dynamic positioning of individual art work alongside research and archival findings in Italy on the basis of a common theme related to Blackness in the Italian socio-historical context. As one of multiple features of the project titled The Recovery Plan including the first museum solo exhibition for each of the artists that will be presented at MAGA over the course of the fall semester, Justin Randolph Thompson will moderate these 5 conversations between October and December. A sixth and final session will be a live and interactive conversation with Thompson accompanied by Janine Gaelle Dieudji, co-curator of The Recovery Plan, where they will be speaking about curatorial activism in the context of this project. A designated question and answer period addressing questions posed by online partcipants is designed to generate dialogue and reflections that can extend back to the classrooms or discussion groups of participating institutions.
SACI is dedicated to supporting diversity, inclusion and equity initiatives in Italy and is a strong supporter of BHMF as an organization including its Italian based project activities such as Black History Month Florence, Black Archive Alliance, and The Recovery Plan.
These projects are illustrative of the dynamic artistic and research activity taking place today in Italy and in Europe. We hope you will join us in these
critical conversations that highlight the seminal roles that, in tandem, artists and scholars can play in engaging in forms of social activism through the recuperation of silenced histories and untold stories of communities and of people, too often marginalized and excluded from local discourses and or national conversations.
Moderated Conversations and Dates
The Recovery Plan, in its pop-up version, serves as the foundation for an initiative by BHMF to develop a Black Cultural Center in Florence as a site dedicated to this work which will serve the community of Florence and
be pioneering as the first of its kind in Italy.
In each session, Thompson will guide a conversation in English with a paired artist and scholar on a different theme corresponding to their artistic, scholary, and archival work from The Recovery Plan. Exclusively registered participants will join the online conversation live via zoom. The artists and scholars will share virtual visits to the pop-up exhibition space at Museo MA*GA Gallarte which will serve as a backdrop to each respective conversation theme and as a reflection on artistic and academic forms of research, while the moderator will lead the dialogue providing contextual backdrops rooted in various periods of Italian history and contemporary society. All sessions will begin at 11 pm Central European Time and will be 90 minutes in length. The Conversations will take place every two weeks with the exception of the concluding discussion. The schedule, artist/scholar pairings, and themes are as follows:
Tuesday, Sept 29:
Italianness and the Colonial Gaze
Binta Diaw with Angelica Pesarini
Tuesday, Oct 13:
Spirituality in Diaspora
Raziel Perin with Simao Amista
Tuesday, Oct 27:
Coffee’s Materiality and Exploitation
Francis Offman with Jessica Sartiani
Tuesday, Nov 10:
Cameroonian Roots in Italy
Victor Fotso Nyie with Patrick Joel Tatcheda Yonkeu
Tuesday, Nov 24:
Jerry Masslo and Italian Based Anti Racist Activism
Emmanuel Yoro with Jordan Anderson
Tuesday, Dec 1:
Curatorial Activism
Justin Randolph Thompson and Janine Gaelle Dieudji
Registration and Fees
Universities can enroll in the complete series of 6 sessions or in one or more of the individual conversations. We highly recommend the entire offering as The Recovery Plan is a unique and groundbreaking initiative in Italy and as the 5 paired artist/scholar conversations followed by the unifying sixth and final session were purposefully selected and organized to provide participants with a comprehensive understanding of Blackness as considered through art, scholarship and archival work in the Italian socio-historical context and as linked to curatorial activism. We encourage and welcome all student, faculty, and staff of a registering institution to participate under a single university registration but ask that registering institutions extend these lectures to only student, faculty, and staff members of the registering instution’s community. Please contact Racini Aranda, SACI Director of Admissions to register or for additional questions about registration or payment information at RAranda@saci-florence.edu.
Fees:
Full Series: $995
Individual Conversation: $250
100% of proceeds go to funding The Recovery Plan and the artists and scholars associated with the project. As SACI’s goal is to ensure that this initiative is as broadly accessible as possible to all types of institutions, discounts are available on the basis of institutional need. Please contact Racini Aranda for questions related to institutional discounts.
ACRAH 