This event celebrates the US launch of Adam Pendleton’s Black Dada Reader. Begun as an in-studio spiral bound publication in 2011, the Reader has evolved into a hardcover collection of texts and documents that elucidates Pendleton’s conceptual framework, “Black Dada.” Black Dada—Pendleton’s term for a broad conceptualization of blackness—is the animating force of his work in painting, video, sculpture, and performance. Published by Koenig Books, the Reader brings a diverse range of cultural figures into a shared cultural space, including Hugo Ball, W.E.B. Du Bois, Stokely Carmichael, Joan Retallack, and Gertrude Stein, as well as artists from different generations, such as Joan Jonas and William Pope.L. It also features essays written for the the Reader by Adrienne Edwards, Laura Hoptman, Tom McDonough, Jenny Schlenzka, and Susan Thompson. The event will highlight the book’s contents through readings and performances by the edition’s editor, Stephen Squibb; poet and John Cage scholar, Joan Retallack; a New Orleans-style brass band (SugarTone Brass Band); and Adam Pendleton.
New York City, NY; NYC