Admission free while places last
proclivity is a work of sound installation and light display and multi-screen video projections. It is one performer's response to Westernised experiences of modernity and misrepresentations of "crisis"—of climate, of migration, of race, of Self—as fixed binary points that might generally trend towards a linear path of progress, rather than themselves representing turning points that offer dynamism through their constant upheaval. Who are we, and when; why does it matter?
SA Smythe is a poet, transdisciplinary artist, translator, and critical theorist committed to black belonging beyond all borders and studying how archives of otherwise possibility come to be narrated, realised, and remembered. They are the editor of Troubling the Grounds: Global Configurations of Blackness, Nativism, and Indigeneity special issue for Postmodern Culture and author of the forthcoming monograph, Where Blackness Meets the Sea: On Crisis, Culture, and the Black Mediterranean and poetry collection, proclivity. Smythe organises with students and other comrades in the broader Cops Off Campus Coalition and other abolitionist and migrant support groups across Turtle Island and in Europe. Their transmedia artwork has been featured in collaborative and solo projects, installations, and festivals. Winner of the 2022 Rome Prize, Smythe is currently based between Rome and occupied Tongva land (Los Angeles). They are a Senior Fellow at the Center for Applied Transgender Studies and an assistant professor in the Depts. of Gender Studies and African American Studies at UCLA.