Zora's is a brainchild of Shanelle Matthews and the Chicago iteration is one of many others that will be happening in cities across the country throughout the year.
A 21st-century Black arts movement is flourishing concurrently—and in many ways is symbiotic to ongoing local, state, and national organizing movements to end state-sponsored violence and indifference toward Black people. Iead, some of our most prolific Black work is borne out of times of heightened suffering and resistance. Author and professor Ayana Mathis addresses this paradoxical experience:
“Even as African-American writing currently experiences unprecedented mainstream appeal and critical recognition, the focus on black expression has another, uglier face: a deadly obsession with black bodies. Thus, it is possible for the Sacramento police to murder a black man holding a cell phone in his grandmother’s backyard and for [Colston] Whitehead to win the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award within a year. How are we to reconcile these truths?”
2018-2020 is the 100th anniversary of the Harlem Renaissance. In the spirit of the Black radical tradition, we’re creating a space to gather, break bread, drink spirits (or your favorite non-alcoholic beverage), and respond to Mathis’s question.
Each month, we’ll be joined by a Black practitioner of the arts (widely encompassing art, writing, music, dance, publishing, food, and other creative capacities) to offer a synopsis of how their work is contributing to Black thought and power building in this era then engage in a lightly moderated debate and discussion.
Zora’s provides a community for curiosity, free of shame and judgment; a platform for discussion and debate in which people who share a vision for the freedom of Black people can disagree with dignity and have a safe space to examine what we do and don’t know about issues that impact our communities.