Public Art Fund Virtual Talks: Black Atlantic Panel

Leilah Babirye (b. 1985, Kampala, Uganda) is an artist and activist who lives and works in Brooklyn. She studied art at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda (2007–10), and participated in the Fire Island Artist Residency in 2015. The artist fled her native Uganda to New York City in 2015 after being publicly outed in a local newspaper. In spring 2018, Babirye was granted asylum with support from the African Services Committee and the NYC Anti-Violence Project. Throughout her multidisciplinary practice, Babirye transforms wood, ceramic, found materials, and paint into figurative subjects that address issues surrounding identity, sexuality, and human rights. Babirye explores the diversity of LGBTQI identities and endows each subject with regal dignity and expressive, tactile beauty. Recent exhibitions include Ebika Bya ba Kuchu mu Buganda (Kuchu Clans of Buganda) at Gordon Robichaux, New York City and Los Angeles and Stephen Friedman Gallery, London; Flight: A Collective History at the Hessel Museum of Art, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY (curated by Serubiri Moses); Stonewall 50 at the Contemporary Arts Museum (CAMH), Houston; and at Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens, where she presented two monumental commissioned sculptures.

Hugh Hayden (b. 1983, Dallas, TX) considers the anthropomorphizing of the natural world as a visceral lens to explore the human condition. Utilizing wood as his primary medium, Hayden transforms familiar objects through a process of selection, carving, and juxtaposition to challenge our perceptions of ourselves, others and the environment. Working with objects loaded with multilayered histories as varied as discarded trunks, rare indigenous timbers, Christmas trees, or souvenir African sculptures, he often combines disparate species, creating new composite forms that also reflect their complex cultural backgrounds. Hayden lives and works in New York City. He holds an MFA from Columbia University and a Bachelor of Architecture from Cornell University. Hayden’s recent solo exhibitions include Huey, Lisson Gallery,  New York City (2021); Boogey Men, Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami (2021); and Brier Patch, commissioned by Madison Square Park Conservancy, New York City, 2022.

Dozie Kanu (b. 1993, Houston, TX) is based in Santarém, Portugal. His research focuses on a concept of sculpture that looks at the production of objects in which a tension between their use and their history, memory, and materiality is embedded. Kanu’s visual language criticizes western art history canons, subtly and elegantly revealing in the objects narratives involving colonialism and identity, focusing on their diasporic condition. Selected exhibitions include Midtown, organized by Salon 94 and Maccarone Gallery, Lever House, New York City (2017); FUNCTION, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York City (2019); Transformer: A Rebirth of Wonder, 180 The Strand, London (2019); Recoil (with Cudelice Brazelton IV), International Waters, Brooklyn (2020); Owe Deed, One Deep, Project Native Informant, London (2020); Enzo Mari, curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist, Triennale Milano, Italy (2020); Crack Up—Crack Down, Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art, Warsaw (2020); value order [gentrify.pt], Galeria Madragoa, Lisbon, Portugal (2021); to prop and ignore, Manual Arts, Los Angeles (2021).

Kiyan Williams (b. 1991, Newark, NJ) is a visual artist and writer who works fluidly across performance, sculpture, video, and 2D realms. Rooted in a process-driven practice, they are attracted to quotidian, unconventional materials and methods that evoke the historical, political, and ecological forces that shape individual and collective bodies. Williams earned a BA with honors from Stanford University and an MFA in visual art from Columbia University. Their work has been exhibited at SculptureCenter, The Jewish Museum, Brooklyn Museum, Socrates Sculpture Park, Recess Art, and The Shed, all in New York City. They have given artist talks and lectures at the Hirshhorn Museum, The Studio Museum in Harlem, Princeton University, Stanford University, Portland State University, Guggenheim Museum, and Pratt Institute. Williams’ work is in private and public collections including the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC.

Public Art Fund Talks, organized in collaboration with The Cooper Union, connect compelling contemporary artists to a broad public by establishing a dialogue about artistic practices and public art. The Talks series feature internationally renowned artists who offer insights into artmaking and its personal, social, and cultural contexts. The core values of creative expression and democratic access to culture and learning shared by both Public Art Fund and The Cooper Union are embodied in this ongoing collaboration. In the spirit of accessibility to the broadest and most diverse public, the Talks are offered free of charge.