Open Eye Gallery book club presents: Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi
THURSDAY 3 JUNE / 6PM / ZOOM / BOOK HERE
Join Open Eye Gallery for a special book club event to compliment The Liverpool Biennial 2021: The Stomach and The Port. We will be reading Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi and discussing it in relation to our exhibiting works by Zineb Sedira and Alberta Whittle.
Homegoing, published in 2016, follows the descendants of two half-sisters born in eighteenth century Ghana whose paths diverge as a result of the colonial project: One, Effia, is married to a British official in a familial trade deal, cementing her family’s status in the colonial nation of the Gold Coast. Her sister, Esi, is captured by raiders and transported to America to be sold into slavery. As Effia’s descendants journey through British colonisation and the battles amongst Fante and Asante nations towards an independent Ghana, Esi’s descendants wrestle with the development of the new diasporic nation of America and the identity of black folk within it.
Tracing three hundred years of history, Homegoing explores the fragmented and yet intertwined lives of both sisters’ descendants on each side of the Atlantic, journeying through both American and Ghanaian history and exposing the generational scars and cultural impact the transatlantic slave trade still has on the world we live in today.
The artists exhibiting at Open Eye Gallery as part of The Liverpool Biennial 2021: The Stomach and the Port explore similar themes in their work. Zineb Sedira’s works, from her Sugar Routes (2013) series, recount the history of transoceanic slavery and forced migration through photographic prints depicting sugar extracted from different parts of the world and housed in a modern warehouse in Marseille. Juxtaposed with two sculptures of an anchor and propeller made from cane sugar found in the French silo, the works act as a metaphor for migration and diaspora.
Alberta Whittle’s film, between a whisper and a cry (2019), is based on Barbadian poet and historian Kamau Brathwaite’s (1930–2020) idea of tidalectics, a way of thinking about the world and identity that draws on oceans and movement, rather than being fixed in a specific country or place. Weather is an important visual and audio element of the film, referencing the legacy of colonial extraction as the starting point for present-day climate instability in the Caribbean, while drawing parallels with the exploitation inherent within the contemporary tourist industry.
We are inviting you to join us for our special book club session, where we will examine Homegoing’s themes of belonging, place, memory, identity and resilience in relation to our two exhibiting artists, their excavations of the long-lasting legacy of the slave trade, and a movement towards healing and nurturing for future generations. We encourage book club goers to have read the book and visited The Liverpool Biennial: The Stomach and The Port in our gallery or virtually, however it is not essential to join the discussion.
More about The Liverpool Biennial 2021: The Stomach and the Port
THURSDAY 3 JUNE / 6PM / ZOOM / BOOK HERE
Join Open Eye Gallery for a special book club event to compliment The Liverpool Biennial 2021: The Stomach and The Port. We will be reading Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi and discussing it in relation to our exhibiting works by Zineb Sedira and Alberta Whittle.
Homegoing, published in 2016, follows the descendants of two half-sisters born in eighteenth century Ghana whose paths diverge as a result of the colonial project: One, Effia, is married to a British official in a familial trade deal, cementing her family’s status in the colonial nation of the Gold Coast. Her sister, Esi, is captured by raiders and transported to America to be sold into slavery. As Effia’s descendants journey through British colonisation and the battles amongst Fante and Asante nations towards an independent Ghana, Esi’s descendants wrestle with the development of the new diasporic nation of America and the identity of black folk within it.
Tracing three hundred years of history, Homegoing explores the fragmented and yet intertwined lives of both sisters’ descendants on each side of the Atlantic, journeying through both American and Ghanaian history and exposing the generational scars and cultural impact the transatlantic slave trade still has on the world we live in today.
The artists exhibiting at Open Eye Gallery as part of The Liverpool Biennial 2021: The Stomach and the Port explore similar themes in their work. Zineb Sedira’s works, from her Sugar Routes (2013) series, recount the history of transoceanic slavery and forced migration through photographic prints depicting sugar extracted from different parts of the world and housed in a modern warehouse in Marseille. Juxtaposed with two sculptures of an anchor and propeller made from cane sugar found in the French silo, the works act as a metaphor for migration and diaspora.
Alberta Whittle’s film, between a whisper and a cry (2019), is based on Barbadian poet and historian Kamau Brathwaite’s (1930–2020) idea of tidalectics, a way of thinking about the world and identity that draws on oceans and movement, rather than being fixed in a specific country or place. Weather is an important visual and audio element of the film, referencing the legacy of colonial extraction as the starting point for present-day climate instability in the Caribbean, while drawing parallels with the exploitation inherent within the contemporary tourist industry.
We are inviting you to join us for our special book club session, where we will examine Homegoing’s themes of belonging, place, memory, identity and resilience in relation to our two exhibiting artists, their excavations of the long-lasting legacy of the slave trade, and a movement towards healing and nurturing for future generations. We encourage book club goers to have read the book and visited The Liverpool Biennial: The Stomach and The Port in our gallery or virtually, however it is not essential to join the discussion.
More about The Liverpool Biennial 2021: The Stomach and the Port
