Description
On July 27, 1919, at a segregated beach on the south side of Chicago, 17-year-old Eugene Williams was stoned to death after floating across the imaginary color line in Lake Michigan. Building on the legend of an underwater paradise prevalent in African folklore, Eugene’s Cove by Lishan AZ imagines an underwater world where those we presumed to have drowned actually sank and became something more. Drawing on mythology and historical events from across the Black diaspora, this underwater photography series celebrates the ways we reclaim water as a source of freedom.
Lishan AZ is a multi-disciplinary artist working in immersive installation, interactive media, photography and film. She explores themes of home, intimacy, and interiority. Her work revives lost narratives in order to contextualize contemporary issues and discover/recover possibilities for our present condition.
Co-edited by Nnaemeka Ekwelum. With a foreword by Felicia Denaud, poetry by Marcela Adeze Okeke, Stephen Hamilton, and Torkwase Dyson, and essays by Joshua Parks, Jheanelle Brown, and Camille Bacon.
