Khaleb Brooks - Emergency Fellowship 2020/21

Last year, I completed a yearlong artist residency at Tate Modern, where I led weekly youth workshops and created work around the transatlantic slave trade. In these workshops I not only learned from the vast collection, but I was also able to see the many gaps in my own knowledge. I know what happened during the Atlantic slave trade, but do I know the personal narratives? Do I understand generational memory? What is the transgender history of the Atlantic slave trade? And how may I better engage with African diasporic cοmmunities outside the Western countries? This work has led to a series of paintings that use historic objects and surrealism to retell history.

I am now pursuing a 6-month residency at the International Slavery Museum (ISM) in Liverpool, UK. The museum's collection offers an in-depth look at historical objects and narratives that are integral to my practice.

My goal is to develop storytelling aspects within my work that will allow for educational engagement and contribute to future youth workshops as well as offer a retelling of history by bringing individual narratives to life.

I intend to discuss the resilience and presence of queer and transgender identities in these histories. While I fear these stories may be few and far between, what excites me, is the opportunity to create them and to inform the current gap in research around black trans/queer history.