This event brought together two contemporary artists, Annalee Davis and Julie Gough, in conversation with Dr. Anna Arabindan-Kesson, Assistant Professor of African American Studies and Art & Archaeology at Princeton University, for a discussion on how their artistic practices are invested in exploring and highlighting the medical and scientific legacies of imperialism.
The conversation was organized by Art Hx (artandcolonialmedicine.com) on Thursday, March 25, 2021 at 8:00 pm EDT / 8:00 pm AST | Friday, March 26, 2021 at 11:00 am AEST.
Annalee Davis is a visual artist, cultural instigator, educator and writer, with a hybrid practice. She works at the intersection of biography and history, focusing on post-plantation economies by engaging with a particular landscape on Barbados. Her studio, located on a working dairy farm, operated historically as a 17th century sugarcane plantation, offering a critical context for her practice by engaging with the residue of the plantation. She has been making and showing her work regionally and internationally since the early nineties. In 2011, Annalee founded Fresh Milk, an arts platform and micro-residency programme. In 2012 she co-founded Caribbean Linked, an annual residency in Aruba, cohering emerging artists, writers and curators from the Caribbean and Latin America. In 2015, she co-founded Tilting Axis, an independent visual arts platform bridging the Caribbean through annual encounters. From 2016-2018, she was Caribbean Arts Manager with the British Council, developing programming in Cuba, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, and part-time tutor at Barbados Community College (2005-2018). She received a BFA from the Maryland Institute, College of Art (1986) and an MFA from Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey (1989).
Julie Gough is a Trawlwoolway (Tasmanian Aboriginal) artist, writer and curator based in Hobart. Her Briggs-Johnson family have lived in the Latrobe region of North West Tasmania since the 1840s, with Tebrikunna in far north eastern Lutruwita (Tasmania) their Traditional Country. Gough’s art and research practice often involves uncovering and re-presenting conflicting and subsumed histories, many referring to her family’s experiences as Tasmanian Aboriginal people. Gough holds a PhD from the University of Tasmania (Visual Arts, 2001), a Masters degree (Visual Arts) University of London, Goldsmiths College (1998), and Bachelor degrees in Visual Arts (Curtin University), Prehistory and English literature (University of West Australia). In 2018 a monograph on her art: Fugitive History, was published by UWA Press, and her short fictionella: Shale, was produced by A Published Event. Since 1994 Julie has exhibited in more than 130 exhibitions that include: TENSE PAST, solo survey exhibition, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, 2019; Divided Worlds, Adelaide Biennial of Australia Art, 2018; Defying Empire, National Gallery of Australia, 2017 and touring; THE NATIONAL, MCA, 2017; With Secrecy and Despatch, Campbelltown Arts Centre, 2016; UNDISCLOSED, National Gallery of Australia, 2012; Clemenger Award, National Gallery of Victoria, 2010; Biennial of Sydney, 2006; Liverpool Biennial, UK, 2001; Perspecta, AGNSW, 1995. Gough’s artwork is held in most Australian state and national gallery collections.
[Originally published on March 31, 2021 via Art HX]