Simone Leigh: Sovereignty
April 23–November 27, 2022
Co-Commissioner: Jill Medvedow, Ellen Matilda Poss Director, ICA/Boston
Co-Commissioner and Curator: Eva Respini, Barbara Lee Chief Curator, ICA/Boston
The ICA Digital Guide on Bloomberg Connects, the official free mobile app of the US Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, provides rich context and background for works on view in Simone Leigh: Sovereignty. The exhibition features a new body of work made for the United States Pavilion. Co-commissioners Jill Medvedow and Eva Respini discuss Leigh’s process, influences, and artistic strategies in a series of audio tracks about individual works in the exhibition. Audio content is also provided in Italian in separate voiced tracks.
A video tour takes viewers inside the exhibition and highlights Leigh’s transformation of the Pavilion’s architecture with Façade, an installation of thatch roofing that resembles a 1930s West African palace. Drawing upon the legacy of the landmark 1931 Paris Colonial Exposition, mounted by the French to display the cultures and peoples of the lands then under European colonial control, the gesture introduces contrasting forms and materials that carry their own histories and interact with the original neoclassical building. Italian subtitles are available.
A short video teaser by artist Shaniqwa Jarvis offers a glimpse inside Simone Leigh’s studio, showing the artist at work on sculptures on view in Sovereignty.
Characterized by an interest in performativity and affect, Leigh’s expansive practice parses the construction of Black femme subjectivity. Her large-scale sculptural works join forms derived from vernacular architecture and the female body, rendering them via materials and processes associated with the artistic traditions of Africa and the African diaspora. Sovereignty commingles disparate histories and narratives, including those related to ritual performances of the Baga peoples in Guinea, early Black American material culture from the Edgefield District in South Carolina, and the landmark 1931 Paris Colonial Exposition. With a series of new bronzes and ceramics both outside and inside the Pavilion, Leigh intervenes imaginatively to fill gaps in the historical record by proposing new hybridities.
Simone Leigh was born in 1967 in Chicago and lives and works in New York City.
The ICA Digital Guide is free for all visitors, whether in-person in Venice or Boston or remote. The guide offers exclusive behind-the-scenes content about art on view at the ICA, including studio-visit and deep-dive videos with artists as well as curator audio tours. Practical information including local dining options and accessibility offerings assists visitors in planning in-person visits.
Bloomberg Connects is a free mobile app featuring guides to over 70 museums, galleries, sculpture parks, gardens, and cultural spaces in one easy-to-use app. The app was created by Bloomberg Philanthropies to help make the art and offerings of cultural organizations more accessible – not just to those visiting in person, but to people around the world. With dynamic content exclusive to each partner organization, the app provides a range of features including video, audio, and text; expert commentary; and wayfinding maps. Follow Bloomberg Connects on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter for updates on new guide launches, exhibit highlights, and more.
Media contact: press [at] icaboston.org
