WuWD@ DOK Leipzig 2020 - Quentin VerCetty - “Dela Move”
In this episode, I speak with award-winning, multidisciplinary visual griot, artrepreneur, art educator, artivist, and ever-growing interstellar tree Quentin VerCetty. Quentin is one of the founding members of the Black Speculative Arts Movement (BSAM) and co-editor of the first Canadian Afrofuturism art anthology, Cosmic Underground Northside: An Incantation of Black Canadian Speculative Discourse and Innerstandings. The term Afrofuturism addresses themes and concerns of the African diaspora through technoculture and science fiction, encompassing a range of media and artists with a shared interest in envisioning black futures that stem from Afrodiasporic experiences. Because Quentin’s vision of Afrofuturism includes looking to our past to conquer the challenges of the present to create a egalitarian future, this week’s song is Chronixx’s “Dela Move.”
Photo Credit: Odille
[Image Description: Quentin is pictured from the waist up. He wears a black coat, grey hat, an African mask pendant, and futuristic glasses. Butterflies rest on his hat and shoulder. In the background is a large silver architectural structure.]
Quentin’s Bio
As one of the world's leading Afrofuturists, Quentin’s scholarly work explores Afrofuturism as a teaching tool and has coined the terms Sankofanology and Rastafuturism. His visual and poetic works explore ideas around an Afrotopia through monumental Afrocentric themes using science fiction themes as a social commentary of contemporary times. VerCetty's is one of the founding members of the Black Speculative Arts Movement (BSAM) and started the BSAM Canada Institute to help improve the art industry for artists of colour in the creative industry of Canada. Artistically, Quentin has traveled the world, exhibiting globally along with being featured in numerous publications.
About the Black Speculative Arts Movement (BSAM)
BSAM, emerged in the wake of Unveiling Visions: Alchemy of The Black Imagination the debut exhibition curated by John Jennings and Reynaldo Anderson at the Schomburg library in New York, in 2015. It has grown into a network of creatives, intellectuals, and artists representing different positions or basis of inquiry including: Afrofuturism, Astro Blackness, Afro-Surrealism, Ethno Gothic, Black Digital Humanities, Black (Afro-future female or African Centered) Science Fiction, The Black Fantastic, Magical Realism, and The Esoteric. Although these positions may seem incompatible, in some instances they overlap around the term speculative and design; and interact around the nexus of technology and ethics. Black Speculative Art is a creative, aesthetic practice that integrates African diasporic worldviews with science or technology and seeks to interpret, engage, design or alter reality for the re-imagination of the past, the contested present, and to act as a catalyst for the future.
