"The most general statement of our politics at the present time would be that we are actively committed to struggling against racial, sexual, heterosexual, and class oppression, and see as our particular task the development of integrated analysis and practice based upon the fact that the major systems of oppression are interlocking. "

Combahee River Collective

  • How and in what ways do black queer creatives use black cultural expressive practice (ie art, music, and spoken word) to articulate a radical politics?

Black Queer organizations and activists have long embraced the Black radical tradition and offered new conceptions linking the relationship between race and class. Radicalism encompasses the need for a complete social change and both Blackness and Queerness is inherently radical and counterproductive to the system of Anglo-Saxon patriarchal heteronormative Judeo-Christian capitalism.

Scholarship/Class Links

Charles White

“Art must be an integral part of the struggle. It can’t simply mirror what’s taking place.”

Toni Cade Bambara

“The role of the artists is to make revolution irresistible” 

#0047bb #0047bb is a process and body of work, that works to demystify the socio-cultural cult of the artist — seizing art production the artist and their practice(s) — back from the historical clutches of the elite and re-positioning them within th
THE ARMORY SHOW, Zanele Muholi, MaID, Philadelphia, 2017. Gelatin silver print, 27 1/2 x 18 1/2 inches.
Zanele Muholi, Sindile II, Room 206 Fjord Hotel, Berlin, 2017. Geltain silver print, 26 3/8 x 39 3/8 inches.
Zanele Muholi, Sandile, Parktown, 2016. Gelatin silver print, 23 1/2 x 22 inches.
Third-Body
Third-Body
Third-Body
RUMORS OF WAR THE CHANCELLOR SEGUIER ON HORSEBACK, 2005 OIL AND ENAMEL ON CANVAS 108" X 72"
“Randerson Romualdo Cordeiro” (2008) is one of the works on display in Kehinde Wiley’s first museum retrospective, at the Brooklyn Museum.Credit...Byron Smith for The New York Times
THE HERRING NET (ZAKARY ANTOINE AND SAMEDY PIERRE LOUISSON) , 2017 OIL ON CANVAS 107.25 X 155.125 IN
Mickalene Thomas, Racquel with Les Trois Femmes, 2018. Chromogenic print, 48 x 60 inches.
Wardell Milan, The Female Body, from the series 5 Indices on a Tortured Body, 2022
Wardell Milan, The Migrant Body, from the series 5 Indices on a Tortured Body, 2022
Wardell Milan, Last summer’s game. Are we still friends?, 2019. Charcoal, graphite, pastel, oil pastel, acrylic paint, cut-and-pasted paper on hand-dyed paper.
Wardell Milan, My knees getting weak, and my anger might explode, but if God got us then we gonna be alright, 2021. Charcoal, graphite, oil pastel, colored pencil, china marker, pastel, cut and pasted paper on hand dyed paper. 51 x 59 1/2 in (129.5 x
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Zanele Muholi, Bester III, Southwest Philadelphia, 2018. Gelatin silver print, 39 3/8 x 34 1/4 inches.

Radical Black Sounds

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  • Tyris Winter - black queer teen idol
    • 12/15/22

    Tyris Winter - black queer teen idol

    A runner-up from the 2020 Button Poetry video contest

  • Cajmere ft. Brighter Days (Underground Goodies Mix)
    • 12/15/22

    Cajmere ft. Brighter Days (Underground Goodies Mix)

    Brighter days was first released in 1992, and has been a Chicago house staple since the early 90s. House music , high-tempo electronic dance music, has been a Chicago cultural project starting a new wave of Black dance music from Techno to Jersey Club. House music like its sister Techno has its roots in Black queer realities and has been used in queer spaces like ballrooms, skating rinks, and queer clubs. These spaces allow Black queer youth and adults to charter new possibilities and escape through music. In Cajmere’s hit track he begins by crying “let me out,” this cry is emblematic of the call for freedom that is embedded within house music. House music like many other Black genres is about subversing the violence and death that make-up life in the anti-black world. The track is fusion of upbeat sounds and futuristic tech based beats create a queer sonics. This queer sonics is deviant to the the traditional instruments and conventions brought to music prior to the 80s. House music like black life is constituted by a system of ups and downs, bringing switches between high energy and rest time.

  • Garden Shed
    • 12/15/22

    Garden Shed

  • Frank Ocean - Chanel
    • 12/15/22

    Frank Ocean - Chanel