Thursday, October 1st at 6pm PST
90 minutes of conversation broadcast at thelab.org

André & Sadie checking in during a moment of grief, stillness and possibility, with discussion moderated by George McCalman.

André D. Singleton is a newly Bay Area (New York City prior) based educator, human rights activist, and multi-disciplinary artist born in Kansas City, MO. Widely known as the co-creator of ‘The Very Black Project,’ a social awareness initiative that celebrates the African Diaspora, he is a thread within a fabric of pioneers on a mission to unite people from an abundance of cultural backgrounds. He’s a Stage IV Hodgkins survivor (remission since 2005). As an artist, survivor and gay man he has been empowered to approach life with a fierce determination to be free and embracing of his truth. Singleton’s work continues to inspire courage, pride, and vulnerability, encouraging people all over the world to respect one another so that our communities might remain enriching for us all.

Sadie Barnette’s work is unconfined to a particular medium. Employing concepts of photography (framing, the edit) to drawing, installation and found object experiments, her modular and iterative practice holds the poetics, and politics, of The Living Room. Barnette’s work deals in collective and familial histories, in earthly acts of celebration and resistance, but is also tethered to the other-worldly, offering glittering speculative spaces. Recent projects include the reclamation of a 500-page FBI surveillance amassed on her father during his time with the Black Panther Party and her interactive reimagining of his bar — San Francisco's first Black-owned gay bar. Born and raised in Oakland, California, she earned her BFA from CalArts and her MFA from the University of California, San Diego. Her work has been exhibited throughout the United States and internationally and is in the permanent collections of museums such as LACMA, BAMPFA, Studio Museum in Harlem (where she was also Artist-in-Residence), Brooklyn Museum and the Guggenheim.

After 14 years as a creative director in the magazine industry, working at highly respected magazines like Entertainment Weekly, Mother Jones and Readade, George McCalman opened the doors to his own practice in 2011. MCCALMAN.CO is a design studio built on the foundation of editorial expertise, bold brand messaging, and personal relationships; his editorial background gives him a unique perspective on commercial branding. In 2016, he recalibrated his professional life by embracing the artists’ path. He now incorporates all aspects of his creative interests into his studio practice, working as a visual journalist, commercial illustrator, and fine artist; in addition to his various branding projects. He is a culture columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle. His first book ‘Illustrated Black History’ will be published summer 2021 by Harper Collins.

The Forum is a bi-weekly experiment in creating discourse within the context of isolation. Art creates a space for reconsidering our knowledge across various social and professional fields. It asks us: Why do we perceive things the way we do? What are we living for? How can we reimagine our relationships to the human and non-human world? The Forum proposes that the project of freedom is a project of making a world with others. So, we invite you to help us answer: what can we do now?

Please bring your ideas, proposals, questions to discuss following the talk.