2021Making Black Space
Story by Iris M. Crawford | Photography by Demondre Ward
Ashara Saran Ekundayo is a Black feminist, independent curator and cultural theologian who views the idea and physical locality of space as an opportunity to cultivate and gather art and people. “Being born and raised in a very Black city like Detroit, MI and on the heels of the Black Power Movement provided a deep impact on my personal and political psyche. Black people were/are the majority, we were beautiful, and we were in charge” said Ekundayo. Her mother moved Ashara and her sister to Denver, CO when she was a teenager. She lived there for 29 years in what Ashara described as a very, very white city. “My mother was still a Black Mama, and my father, who had moved to NYC, was still a Black man,” says Ekundayo. There was no confusion in my mind regarding my Black identity nor my understanding of the necessity to make space for our people.”
As an artist, young mother of 2 Black sons, and a politically active student living in Denver, Ashara collaborated with a myriad of creatives to steward venues such as the Starz Denver Pan African Film Festival and the Cafe Nuba poetry venue. These events marked the Mile High creative landscape for 15 years on the last Friday of every month and featured literary greats that included Gil Scott Heron, Jessica Care Moore and Saul Williams. “I’ve been blessed to have had intimate time with writers, poets, and filmmakers from the African Diaspora,” said Ekundayo.
“I’ve been able to travel all over the world viewing and discussing Black film and Black life and what it means to be intentional in designing a particular narrative and place.” By Black, she meant centering stories of the Black and African experience specifically viewed through gender. Throughout this journey the fuel that fed her inquiry was her own lived experience as a Black woman and women’s position as the bedrock of all social movements.
For Ekundayo, Blackness represents a particular kind of creative offering. “Blackness is what we love — we love Black culture, but the structures and trappings of the larger society has shown that we don’t actually love Black people.” As someone who was born and raised in the United States, she believes that Black culture is what this country exports to the world. But as we also know, Black people continue to be hyper-policed and politically silenced. Despite all of this, Ekundayo’s craving and commitment to Blackness kept her focused on it. “There is a long list of spaces that I’ve created, co-created and curated in concert and collaboration with social practice artists and organizers. Ekundayo goes on to say “in fact, my desire to participate more fully in the historical legacy of serving Black people inspired my move to Oakland, CA in 2010.”
October 2017 marked the serendipitous start of the Ashara Ekundayo Gallery in Oakland’s Uptown Arts District. While participating as a juror for an upcoming artist residency at the Chandra Cerrito Gallery which was one block from Impact Hub Oakland, the 16,000 sq. ft. coworking community Ekundayo co-founded with 6 other creative entrepreneurs five years prior, where she served as Chief Creative Officer and curator at Omi Arts — her present art gallery. She asked Cerrito what was happening with the gallery space in the back of her building as it was then sitting empty. Cerrito asked if she was looking for a new gallery space and Ekundayo, without hesitation said yes. “There was no plan...no business model for a commercial gallery in mind,” said Ekundayo. She had not yet spoken out loud of her plans for leaving her company, however a month and a half later, she signed a lease on the open space and decided it’s going to be a gallery and project space that exclusively exhibits the work of Black women and femmes. The space also served as the offices for her company, AECreative Consulting Partners, LLC.
The first show was called “Obvious Magic: This Womanist Imaginary” culled from Ekundayo’s family upbringing, academic training and personal creative arts practice that is rooted in radical Black feminist thought. A curatorial politic deeply influenced by the work of the Combahee River Collective, the Black Arts Movement, the Spira Arts Collective, the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense and more. She goes on to say, “there is a psychic knowing that is passed down in utero through melanin and through Black women that pushes us toward a collective freedom. I place myself inside the tradition of cultural workers who are interested in discussing their relationships to the social justice movement building for Black Lives, the shifting landscape of American art, and the culture and politics that dictate power.”
Also, I insist that Black women have ours,” said Ekundayo.
Her immediate “yes” to the offering of space to launch her eponymous gallery and other projects is often how she makes decisions. “There is a trust I have in the messages and signs given by my Ancestors. There are many ideas of universes swirling around me and I am paying attention and walking on faith,” said Ekundayo.
“Our relationship with self, with nature and with Spirit supports how I navigate time travel as well as how I see, move, convene, understand, and conjure space,” Ekundayo says. “I dream of it, I visualize it, and I speak it into existence because I am powerful.” What does the universe then do? — “She conspires to provide everything I asked for.”
“The Black [Space] Residency is one of the current iterations of trust.” says Ekundayo. ”The artist residency is a pilot project that was imagined and co-designed by Ekundayo and fine arts photographer Erica Deeman who met seven years ago a through mutual friend and curator Kevin Chin. Five years later Deeman offered to present two studio workshops called, “Lighting Blackness” as part of the curated GAZE Art series at Ekundayo’s gallery-turned “artist residency” space for three Black womxn artists that summer. This series was designed to be “low — barrier to high art” designed and executed by Black, lesbian, gay, queer, trans, and gender non conforming people and incuded artists such as South African filmmaker/activist Beverly Ditsie. In the Fall of 2019 as Deeman was preparing to make the transition to graduate school she approached Ekundayo for her help in making sure that space for Black artists was maintained inside her current studio space located at the Minnesota Street Studios in San Francisco’s Dogpatch neighborhood.
“When I say artists as first responder, that means that I recognize creative labor as work.”
“There are maybe 40 artists in the space, but there have only ever been 3 longtime Black artists in that space,” Ekundayo says. Black [Space] Residency artists-in-residence have access to Minnesota Street Project’s resources including a dark room, wood shop, ceramics lab, digital print studio as well as a weekly “coffee-stipend,” support from Adobe (who also keeps a digital lab in the building), and a membership at the Museum of the African Diaspora. One of the most poignant realizations for Ekundayo and Deeman was that during the time that we were designing the Black Space Residency, the Minnesota Street Project Foundation was launching their call for Black curators for its California Black Voices Fellowship. “They did not reach out to, consult, or say anything at all to the three Black artists who had been taking up space since the beginning ,we saw the announcement on social media like everyone else” said Ekundayo.
Once the initial design of Black [Space] residency was settled, Ekundayo and Deeman bootstrapped it by asking other Black creatives to help pay the rent for the next two years. The questions that began to unfold were: What does Residency mean? What does it look like to create an unapologetic container for Black people during the COVID19 global pandemic and statewide shelter-in-place orders? What does it mean to “choose ourselves?” Thus far, the Residency has garnered support from organizations such as the African American Art and Culture Complex, the Villa San Francisco/French American Cultural Society, and Ekundayo’s own philanthropic arts platform Artist As First Responder. Now in 2021, Black Space Residency has supported artists working in photography, printmaking, sculpture, film and choreography through an Invite-Only model executed by the now official Collective of nine advisory board members. “This is what we call relational-aid in our artist community,” Ekundayo says. “That’s what fellowships mean to me — living inside an understanding of abundance and care for one another and providing financial resources as well as the ultimate commodity, time,” said Ekundayo. “It comes down to intention and insistence — and how we’re going to take up, wield and hold space. Black [Space] Residency is pinned as a container for the imagination, activity, inquiry and rest for Black creatives and will have an Open Call for Black creative to apply to take up space in 2022
Ekundayo’s latest creation is Artist As First Responder, a six-point philanthropic and interactive arts organization born from her research and the witnessing of artists as first responders and essential workers. “The truth is that artists show up first in both catastrophe and celebration. I want others to recognize and engage in that truth and act accordingly to support artists whose creative practices heal communities and save lives.” The areas of focus and work include Black [Space] Residency, art exhibitions, site-specific ceremony, a printed publication and an ongoing public form both titled BLATANT, and the Reflection Fund for Artists, a mutual-aid regranting experiment launched in late 2020 in partnership with the City of Oakland Human Services Department and a federal grant that invites citizens to engage in Resiliency in Communities After Stress and Trauma (ReCAST), Ekundayo has been the lead Cultural Strategist for the project for the past 4 years. The Reflection Fund for Artists provides direct, unrestricted cash awards to Black, Indigenous and other Artists of Color living and working primarily in her chosen home of Oakland. As a curator, mentor and activist Ekundayo asks questions of “What does my protest look like? What am I calling in? When I say artist as first responder, does that mean that I recognize creative labor as work that folks should be well-compensated for?” Her resounding “yes” reiterates that recognizing it, featuring it, uplifting it and archiving this work is paramount to her own art practice.
Ashara’s curatorial practice is not only social but highly spiritual, joy-informed, and Afrofuturist in nature as well. “The spiritual energy, psychic blood, and the power of love are parts of the spell she casts to literally make space,” said Ekundayo. Engaging in this work to center and amplify Blackness for the past 35 years has taught her that like many other healers in the community, you are also healed through your service. “I am a Black womxn. I am an artist. I’m looking for a way to heal myself and to wage beauty for my Ancestors who came before me and for those who are coming after me, àshe!” U
Learn more about Ashara and her work at www.artistasfirstresponder.com
Iris M. Crawford is an environmental justice advocate, social impact strategist, and poet. With roots in Brooklyn and strong ties to nature, she emphasizes social justice, climate justice, and racial equity through her work. Iris brings a unique blend of journalism and strategic expertise to her projects, working at the intersection of policy, storytelling, and environmental advocacy. For more details, you can visit her page here.
