LIVE PERFORMANCE: reVERSE-gesture-reVIEWed

In this unique performance, Thomas F. DeFrantz and SLIPPAGE explore the provocation of Kara Walker's Harper's Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated) with shadowplay, dance and image subtraction technology. Wondering at the place of black women's presence in the landscape of the Civil War, SLIPPAGE will reverse and review the potent imagery that Walker has created in response to the exhibition of prints on view at the Nasher. How can the physical gestures of dance expand the ways we might look at these visual works of art? How can dance open up interpretation and suggest even more revisionist histories of the African American presence in the visual archive of the Civil War?

SLIPPAGE is directed by Thomas F. DeFrantz, Professor and Chair of African and African American Studies at Duke. The performance will include collaborations by eto otitigbe, Shireen Dickson and Brittany Williams.