Virtual residence There Are Black People In The Future Artwork-In-Residence

There Are Black People In The Future is a virtual residency led by artist Alisha B. Wormsley, in collaboration with Goethe Pop Up Houston and Project Row Houses. This residency invites artists, teachers and activists to explore the relevance of Wormsley’s text There Are Black People In The Future in their own communities. The residency program includes an honorarium of $1,000, workshops, collaborative discussions and final presentations.

The outcomes of the residency will be presented virtually November 16-21, 2020. Tune-in on our Facebook and Instagram pages @GoethePopUpHouston.   

Read about the residents and their projects below.
There Are Black People in the Future is an afro-futurist interdisciplinary body of work that Alisha B. Wormsley began developing in 2012, which includes video, prints, collages, sculptures, and billboards. In 2018 the sentence was removed from a billboard in a newly gentrified neighborhood in Pittsburgh by developers. For Wormsley, it's removal transformed that one sentence into a movement, one in which the public was encouraged to use her words for the betterment of the world around them. 
 
In response to the billboard’s removal, There Are Black People In The Future Artwork-in-Residence was launched in 2019 in Pittsburgh. One year later, against the backdrop of a wave of new development in the city of Houston, and the Third Ward specifically, Goethe Pop Up Houston and Project Row Houses initiated a virtual iteration.
 
In conjunction with this residency program, Wormsley and Houston-based artist Phillip Pyle II will design flags with the text There Are Black People In The Future. The flags will be installed this fall at Project Row Houses.
 
© Alisha B. Wormsley Alisha B. Wormsley is an interdisciplinary artist and cultural producer based in Pittsburgh, PA. Her work focuses on collective memory and the synchronicity of time, specifically through the stories of women of color. Read more about Wormsley’s work here.

Project Row Houses is a community platform that enriches lives through art with an emphasis on cultural identity and its impact on the urban landscape. They engage neighbors, artists, and enterprises in collective creative action to help materialize sustainable opportunities in marginalized communities. Project Row Houses occupies a significant footprint in Houston’s Historic Third Ward, one of the city’s oldest African-American neighborhoods. The site encompasses five city blocks and houses 39 structures that serve as home base to a variety of community enriching initiatives, art programs, and neighborhood development activities.
 

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