Steffani Jemison
On Similitude: A Lecture-Workshop
The Herb Alpert Award in the Arts
Thursday, April 28, 2022
4:30-6 pm, Langley Hall
Open to the CalArts community
"I wanted to act, but my body was in the way.” This interactive lecture-workshop adapts Jemison’s 2019 performance On Similitude, an exploration of mimicry and gesture. As Jemison narrates her research through the recent history of pantomime, from exercises created by 19th-century acting instructor Francois Delsarte to the 21st century practice of mime ministry, participants will test and explore the capacity of their own bodies to be animated by another. Please come prepared to move as you listen. All bodies are welcome.
Steffani Jemison is a multidisciplinary artist whose work is concerned with histories of Black performance in vernacular traditions such as pantomime and vaudeville, as well as the intersections of these practices with early film history. Drawing on movement research and archival materials, her work bears witness to the ways in which knowledge is held and transferred from body to body, to the present. Her exhibition, END OVER END, is currently on view at JOAN, Los Angeles, through April 30.
Steffani Jemison was born in 1981 in Berkeley, CA, and raised in Cincinnati, OH. A professor of Art & Design at Rutgers University, Jemison’s first novel will be published by Primary Information later this year. Since 2016, she has been a part of the musical collaborative, Mikrokosmos, with Justin Hicks. Her work has been the subject of solo exhibitions and special projects at the Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati (2021); Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (2019); Nottingham Contemporary (2018); Mass MoCA, North Adams, MA; Jeu de Paume, Paris (both 2017); RISD Museum, Providence (2015); and LAXART, Los Angeles (2013), among other venues. She has also been included in numerous group exhibitions, including Greater New York at MoMA PS1 (2021) and the Whitney Biennial (2019), as well as at venues including the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; the Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia (both 2019); the Drawing Center, New York (2015); and the Studio Museum in Harlem (2012). She is the recipient of the 2021 Herb Alpert Award in the Arts in the Visual Arts category. Jemison currently lives and works in Brooklyn.
Image: Steffani Jemison, In Succession (2019) (still), HD video, black and white, sound, 18:19. Courtesy of the artist and Greene Naftali, New York.