This course takes a hemispheric look at how to think through the goals of decolonization and decoloniality and how they are being shaped by artists, activists, and academics in the post-neoliberal world. It pays critical attention to activist and art movement-based projects that have occurred in the last 5 years in the United States such as the People's Cultural Plan, Decolonize this Place, The Black School, Chinatown Art Brigade, The Illuminator, Black Quantum Futurism, or StrikeMOMA. This is the ground for present-day decolonization. 

Although relevant theory and history is covered during the lecture time, the course draws most heavily from the participants sharing ideas and works from their own region and particular interests. The goal is to begin the work of collaboration by coming to understand each other's situations, and to form community. The course intends to bring together practitioners, academics, and activists to share skills, knowledge and possibilities and is conceived as a place for people working through the many challenges of the present to learn by sharing and through mutual support. 

The course will work towards creating a collaborative, free, downloadable, decolonized 'curriculum' in the sense of Paulo Freire's "practices of freedom." Among others, we will address the question of how decolonizing can remain grounded, continue to make territorial acknowledgements, advocate for restitution and reparations, and create new perception under these ever-changing conditions. 
 

Syllabus

About Alicia Grullón

Alicia Grullón uses performance and self-portrait (re)composing popular histories as a critique on the politics of presence - an argument for the inclusion of marginalized communities in political and social spheres. Grullón has participated in exhibitions including The 8th Floor, Bronx Museum of the Arts, BRIC House for Arts and Media, El Museo del Barrio, and Columbia University. She has received grants from the Puffin Foundation, Department of Cultural Affairs of the City of New York, and Franklin Furnace Archives. Grullón has participated in residencies at the Hemispheric Institute for Politics and Performance at New York University, Center for Book Arts, and Bronx Museum of Arts AIM Program. Her work has been reviewed in Hyperallergic, ArtNet News, New York Times and Women&Performance: A Journal of Feminist THeory. Grullón is a recipient of hte 2019 Colene Brown Art Prize and the 2020-2022 Walentas Fellowship at Moore College of Art and Design in Philadelphia. Grullón will have a solo exhibition at Moore College opening July 31 through September 25th, 2021. Grullón is an adjunct at the City University of New York and the School of Visual Arts and has an MFA from the State University of New York and a BFA from New York University. She has completed Doctoral course work in Art and Education at the Teachers College at Columbia University. 
https://aliciagrullon.com/home.html