On Saturday 12 May 2018 BAK, basis voor actuele kunst, Utrecht, opens the exhibition First Person Plural: Empathy, Intimacy, Irony and Anger. The exhibition features works by Doug Ashford and Liz Magic Laser, along with Sven Augustijnen, Tala Madani, Eva and Franco Mattes, Otobong Nkanga, and Sarah Vanhee, as well as a library space conceived by 2017/2018 BAK Fellow Sepake Angiama.

Following the opening, New York-based artist, teacher and writer Doug Ashford will present the talk “Painting the Anti-Human”. Introducing his works on show in the exhibition, Ashford offers abstraction as something to re-imagine plural and collective narratives. He looks at historically important events in social movements and suggests that events and objects can be reassessed through sensory perception. In doing so, historical continuity can be opened up to collective fictions, and discussions about what “we” are or who “we” may become can begin differently again.

Program:
17.00 Doors open
18.00–19.00 Lecture and Q&A with Doug Ashford
19.00–20.00 Screening of Sarah Vanhee’s The Making of Justice (2017)
21.00 End

The opening is free of charge. Capacity for the lecture and screening is limited, please register directly with BAK here to ensure a spot. If you’re planning on just visiting the exhibition, registration is not necessary.

More information on the exhibition here.

Image: Doug Ashford, still from Bunker 2, 2017 (digital video)