Project Obtuse Performance
Event Details
Project Obtuse Performance
Wednesday, September 18, 2024 at 5:30 PM ET
Free, In-Person Event | Hosted at the Asian Arts Initiative, 1219 Vine St, NOT at the Library Company
We hope you will join us at the Asian Arts Initiative for the premiere performance of Project Obtuse. In Project Obtuse, Jicarilla Apache artist Zachariah Julian uses color, sound, and movement to confront a dark chapter in the history of indigenous peoples in America. To inform and inspire his composition, Julian, along with scholar Paul Wolff Mitchell, examined the work of Samuel George Morton (1799-1851), whose papers reside, in part, at the Library Company. Morton is known today as among the most influential architects of scientific racism in the United States, both for his publications – most notably Crania Americana (1839) – and for his collection of nearly one thousand human skulls from across the world, amassed and measured during his lifetime to supply the “data” for these works. For Project Obtuse, Julian worked with Mitchell to explore how Morton’s thinking developed and how his theories still affect us today. Through composition and performance, Julian will shift our gaze away from the chapter written by Morton and his colleagues and toward a thriving present and future that Indigenous Americans write for themselves. The performance will be followed immediately by a panel discussion with Julian and Mitchell, led by Library Company Curator of Printed Books Rachel D’Agostino.
Beyond Glass Cases is supported by The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage.
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