LIVE ART LUNCH #1
SEPARATIST PERFORMANCE
ZINZI MINOTT & TARIK ELMOUTAWAKIL
HOSTED BY JANINE FRANCOIS
ZOOM DISCUSSION
Sat 22 May 2021
1pm (60-90 mins)
Content Note: this conversation will include discussion around people’s experiences of racism.
ACCESS: This discussion will be live captioned & British Sign Language interpreted by Nikki Harris & Rebekkah Spencer.
A conversation between artists Zinzi Minott and Tarik Elmoutawakil, hosted by Janine Francois.
The conversation will be driven by Zinzi’s recent research as part of her Adrian Howell’s Award, interrogating what it means to create separatist, Black-only spaces for performance. How do we understand separatism and exclusion in relation to liveness and care? In creating Black-only spaces for performance might we create something special, radical and intimate? Together the artists will share their processes and explorations of this way of working, alongside synergies and differences with radical inclusivity and the challenges and opportunities separatist Black-only spaces offer.
For our Live Art Lunches this year, things are a little different. We understand we can’t be together in person, but please feel welcome to bring a cuppa or maybe even your lunch along with you. There will be an opportunity to take part in the Q+A as part of this event by submitting a question into the chat - if you need any support with this, or would like to submit a question in advance, please contact us. Questions will be selected by the host.
Zinzi Minott was the recipient of the Adrian Howells Award for Intimate Performance 2020. Her work focuses on the relationship between dance, bodies and politics. Her work explores how dance is perceived through the prisms of race, queer culture, gender and class. In recent years she was Artist in Residence at the Serpentine Gallery, Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Rich Mix and Dance Research Space, resident artist at Somerset House and a One Dance UK Trailblazer. Most recently she was awarded the Arts Council England’s Artist International Development Fund, the Jerwood Micro Bursary and the Live Art UK Diverse Actions Leadership Bursary, and is currently one of two artists commissioned under CONTINUOUS - a four-year partnership between BALTIC (Gateshead) and Siobhan Davies Dance.
Zinzi was struck by Adrian Howells’ understanding of the “Power and transformative possibility that can be achieved through intimate personal connection to his audiences”, and through the award wants to create intimate moments of dance transmission between Black Women (Trans inclusive) as an act of healing, outside of the gaze of whiteness and maleness.
https://www.zinziminott.com
Tarik Elmoutawakil (UK) is an artist and producer, and co-founder/co-director of The Marlborough Theatre (Brighton) and creator of Brownton Abbey, the afro futuristic space-church themed performance party that centres celebrates and elevates queer, trans and intersex people of colour, to creatively address systemic problems of inequality and isolation for minoritised and marginalised communities.