Posted: October 23, 2020Written by: Ritchie Bermudez

SAN LUIS OBISPO – The public is invited to a discussion with Allana Clarke in the fourth installment of the Laboratory Series, a conversation series with Black-identified artists hosted by the Harold J. Miossi Art Gallery at Cuesta College in collaboration with R.A.C.E. Matters San Luis Obispo.

The event is on Thursday, Oct. 29, from 5:00 – 6:30 p.m. and will be held virtually via Zoom. Registration is available online at bit.ly/cuestalabseries4.

Allana Clarke is a Trinidadian-American artist whose practice is built upon a foundation of uncertainty, curiosity, a will to heal, and an insistence upon freedom. Fluidly moving through video, performance, photography, and text, her research-based practice incorporates socio-political and art historical texts, to contend with ideas of Blackness, the binding nature of bodily signification, and of the possibility to create non-totalizing identifying structures.

“This is the fourth event for our Laboratory Series and a particularly exciting one because of Allana's multidisciplinary practice,” said Emma Saperstein, Cuesta College Harold J. Miossi Art Gallery Coordinator. “She has extensive experience in the contemporary art world on a number of different platforms.”

Clarke received her BFA in photography from New Jersey City University and an MFA in Interdisciplinary Practice from MICA’s Mount Royal School of Art. Clarke has been an artist in residence at the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture, The Vermont Studio Center, Lighthouse Works, and Yaddo. She has received several grants including the Toby Devan Lewis Fellowship, Franklin Furnace Fund, and a Puffin Foundation Grant. She is currently a 2020 NXTHVN fellow and an assistant professor at Wayne State University in Detroit.

For more information on future Laboratory Series events, please visit the Harold J. Miossi Art Gallery webpage at cuesta.edu or call (805) 546-3202.