Registration for this event is closed. || Join us for a virtual artist talk with New City Arts January 2021 Fellow, Ashon Crawley, on Thursday, January 28 at 7:30PM. Registration is required for this free, virtual event. Sign up here. Ashon will give a 45 minute talk, followed by a 15 minute Q&A.
During Ashon's Fellowship with New City Arts in January 2021, he is creating various pieces that explore the concepts of sameness, difference, that attempt to think about versions of the nothingness of blackness, of blackqueerness. Working with scripture, with hymns, with concordance, with shouting, the various pieces were created by attempting to figure out a way to relate to a religious and spiritual world of plentitude and possibility, the space and complexity and contradiction of Blackpentecostalism. He is extending the foundations of his two books, Blackpentecostal Breath: The Aesthetics of Possibility and The Lonely Letters, into several large-scale paintings using an audiovisual practice that includes dancing, painting, and singing in rhythm with Blackpentecostal hymns.
MEET THE ARTIST
Ashon Crawley is an audiovisual artist attempting to honor blackqueer life and spirituality. Having grown up and learned about life and love in the spiritual space of Blackpentecostalism, Ashon uses choreography to paint, hand clapping to splatter, and his voice to sing and make music.
ABOUT THE FELLOWSHIP
The New City Arts Fellowship at Welcome Gallery supports six Charlottesville-area artists from January-June 2021 working on projects related to the theme Next Breath: History, Hate, Possibility, written by Maurice Wallace. During their fellowship, artists are working to address the ongoing impacts of systemic racism and the COVID-19 pandemic through creative projects that deeply and imaginatively relate to breath as the essence of life and freedom. Each artist receives one month in 2021 to transform Welcome Gallery into their studio space, a $400 honorarium, a stocked pantry with their favorite snacks, and an opportunity to engage the community with their work at the conclusion of their fellowship.
To learn more about these artists and their fellowship projects, visit our website. Opportunities to engage with their work are ongoing from January-June 2021. The New City Arts Fellowship is supported by a Community Recovery & Catalyst grant from the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation and Maurice Wallace and Pam Sutton-Wallace.
