Artists Andile Dyalvane, King Houndekpinkou, Chuma Maweni, Nandipha Mntambo, Zanele Muholi and Zizipho Poswa currently have works featured in the Museum of the African Diaspora’s (MoAD) group exhibition, ‘Liberatory Living: Protective Interiors and Radical Black Joy,’ on until 2 March 2025. Curated by Chief of Curatorial Affairs and Public Programs at MoAD Key Jo Lee, the exhibition presents designs, artworks and environments dedicated to the “global necessity for Black people to cultivate domestic interiors not only as spaces of revolutionary action, but also of radical joy and revolutionary rest”, says Lee. Conceptually, ‘Liberatory Living’ evokes American author bell hooks’ concept of “Homeplace,” or those concrete spaces which inspire that [particular] feeling of safety, arrival and homecoming.
Concurrently, literary scholar Elizabeth Alexander’s notion of the “Black interior” unfolds as a space of unlimited imagination — a “Black imaginary” that challenges us to envision what we are not meant to, capturing themes society often overlooks. These include ideas around complex Black identities, genuine and actionable Black empowerment as well as rampant and unfetishised Black beauty. These two Black feminist frameworks collaborate in Lee’s curatorial idea of spaces crafted to incubate “Black Joy”, an idea expressed theoretically and materially throughout the exhibition. Featuring sixteen contemporary artists and designers, ‘Liberatory Living’ brings together a selection of furnishings, wall coverings, lighting, ceramics and other atmospherics to suggest what might be necessary to construct and sustain a sense of safety and belonging, in response to the enduring need for beauty to bolster those sensibilities. Six of these artists are Southern Guild artists offering a perspective of Black joy from the African lens.
The exhibit also blends custom and retail objects, showcasing a broad spectrum of work that reflects a persistent impulse to create spaces that offer sensory circumstances for profound relief. The first exhibition of its kind at MoAD, ‘Liberatory Living: Protective Interiors and Radical Black Joy’ is an open invitation to deep communal contemplation of contemporary interior design integral to dismantling destructive colonial legacies and opening spaces of Radical Black Joy without fetishising Black strength and resilience. Other featured artists who are not Southern Guilds artists include Angela Hennessy, Chantal Hildebrand, Cheryl R. Riley, dach&zephir, Germane D. Barnes, Kapwani Kiwanga, Lina Iris Viktor, Malene Djenaba Barnett, Michael Bennett, Norman Teague, Sandra Githinji Studio, Sheila Bridges and Traci Johnson.
