Weber State University Mary Elizabeth Dee Shaw Gallery Hosts Utah Debut of Internationally-Renowned Artist, Fahamu Pecou

The Mary Elizabeth Dee Shaw gallery aspires to engage a diverse audience, create a sense of community, provide insight into the creative process, and challenge visitors to contemplate, discuss and understand the historical, social, and cultural context of contemporary art. It serves the Department of Visual Art & Design, Weber State University and the community of Northern Utah by presenting the work of local, regional, and nationally recognized artists, including new work, emerging media and original scholarship.

What: DO or DIE: Affect, Ritual, Resistance

This solo exhibition features the work of Fahamu Pecou, an artist immersed in the exploration of the tenuous nature of Black existence. Through the shameful legacies of slavery and Jim Crow to today's #BlackLivesMatter, black bodies are disproportionately affected by violence. In the midst of these life and death struggles Pecou asks, "Under looming threat of death, how might we inspire life? Through what mechanisms could we resist the psychological violence and despair inspired by the threat of violence and usher in hope? Or how might art serve as a space of resistance?"

DO or DIE: Affect, Ritual, Resistance serves as one artist's action in opposition to these overwhelming societal forces, seeking instead to elevate and re-contextualize Black life and death. Through performance, painting, drawing and video Pecou reframes our view by incorporating references to Yoruba/ Ifa ritual, cultural retentions of hip-hop and the philosophy of Négritude. He shapes a story that seeks to affirm life via an understanding of the balance between life and death.

As Pecou states: "DO or DIE is a different type of spectacle, one that distances itself from the terror and violence typically associated with Black bodies. It affirms life and life beyond. It reclaims what was lost, turning our gaze inward and ultimately forward. Through ritual, performance and image, the exhibit challenges the perception of death's dominion. Ultimately, DO or DIE is a reminder of an intimate balance that affirms life. It is art as affective resistance. It is a healing."

When: The show opens on February 23 and runs through April 7, 2018. An Artist lecture will take place Thurs, Feb. 22 at 6 p.m. The exhibit will open on Fri., Feb. 23 at 6 p.m. with a special "Intercessions" discussion featuring hip hop artist, Prynce Hamilton and art historian, Kenneth Hartvigsen.

Where: Weber State University Kimball Visual Arts Building (Map available here)

Info: Event is free and open to the public, no ticket is required

Contact: For more information or to arrange an interview with Fahamu Pecou, please contact Christie Denniston, Director of Marketing & PR for the Lindquist College of Arts and Humanities at [email protected] or at 801-626-6431.                                               

SOURCE Weber State University Telitha E. Lindquist College of Arts & Humanities

Related Links

http://www.weber.edu/performingarts