CREATIVE TIME & BROOKLYN MUSEUM PRESENT:
IN PURSUIT OF LIFE, LIBERTY, AND HAPPINESS
REIMAGINING AMERICAN DEMOCRACY
Friday, October 23 | 11 AM–5:30 PM
Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Auditorium, 3rd Floor, Brooklyn Museum
ABOUT
On Friday, October 23, Creative Time and the Brooklyn Museum bring together artists, activists, and scholars for a full day of conversations, presentations, poetry, and performance reckoning with the most urgent issues shaping contemporary political life.
Two hundred and fifty years ago, the principles of “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” were enshrined in the Declaration of Independence as guiding aspirations for the United States of America. What strategies for justice can we enact to move toward these unrealized promises? In this gathering, artists, activists, and scholars reckon with the most urgent issues shaping contemporary political life, from migration and reproductive justice to mass criminalization and climate change. The convening critically examines who historically benefited from the story of US democracy and orients us toward how we can build expansive futures rooted in self-determination, dignity, and freedom.
SPEAKERS
American Artist
Mary Enoch Elizabeth Baxter
Tega Brain
Mona Chalabi
Johanna Hedva
Sky Hopinka
Qween Jean
Mariame Kaba
Sam Lavigne
Dean Majd
Chelsea Manning
Paola Ramos
Viva Ruiz
Dr. Yomaira C Figueroa-Vásquez
Jackie Wang
Full lineup and schedule to be announced soon.
CONVERSATIONS
LIFE / Beyond Borders: Mapping Movement and Migration Histories
This conversation considers migration through the lens of the right to life, exploring freedom of movement, safety, belonging, and home-making. Situating contemporary struggles for migrant justice within longer histories of colonialism, racism, and exclusion, presenters draw on art, data, and organizing to envision futures beyond borders. Featuring Mona Chalabi, illustrator and writer; Sky Hopinka, visual artist and filmmaker; Paola Ramos, journalist; and Dr. Yomaira Figueroa-Vásquez, scholar and director of the Center for Puerto Rican Studies.
LIBERTY / After Incarceration: Envisioning Abolitionist Futures
Nearly two million people in the United States are incarcerated in state and federal prisons and local jails—the largest known prison population in the world. From conceptual art to community processes for accountability, this conversation recontextualizes the constitutional promise of freedom through an abolitionist lens. Together speakers imagine alternatives to the US culture of punishment and caging that instead seek justice and repair. Featuring American Artist, artist; Mary Enoch Elizabeth Baxter, interdisciplinary artist, writer, and cultural worker; Mariame Kaba, archivist, educator, and writer; and Jackie Wang, poet, scholar, and author of Carceral Capitalism.
PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS / Presentations
In dynamic 10-minute presentations on their projects, speakers grapple with our fraught democracy while envisioning visualizing future possibilities. Featuring Tega Brain, artist and engineer, and Sam Lavigne, artist and educator; Johanna Hedva, artist, musician, and writer; Dean Majd, artist; Viva Ruiz, artist and founder of Thank God for Abortion; Qween Jean, costume designer and founder of Black Trans Liberation; and Chelsea Manning, technologist and data scientist.
Featuring poetry by Nicole Sealey.
TICKETS
Tickets are $30 ($18 for Brooklyn Museum Members).
PURCHASE TICKETS HERE
This program will include ASL interpretation. For accessibility accommodations, email access@brooklynmuseum.org.
Copresented in partnership with Brooklyn Museum.
This convening is part of Drawing America: US@250. A season of art installations, programs, and partnerships, Drawing America honors those who have imagined a more equitable future and fought for the promise of our democracy—and those who continue to do so today.