Still from Maman Brigitte (2021)

As part of Prismatic Ground festival selections, Maman Brigitte is available to stream on The Criterion Channel through 2027.

Description:
Maman Brigitte stitches together the intimacy of a private ritual involving the Voodoo Ioa Maman Brigitte with the sound of the body (spitting, running, vomiting, etc.). These "interior" corporeal practices are juxtaposed against sweeping landscapes to draw out film/ritual's capacity to make the hidden manifest.

May 6th

"Close, but no Cigar" (trilogy) lovertits (Ayanna Dozier, 16mm, 4 min); A Picture for Parco (Ayanna Dozier, 16mm, 3 min); an exercise in parting (Ayanna Dozier, 16mm, 4 min), followed by a Q&A.

2:30 PM at The Light Industry

When I Am Empty Please Dispose of Me Properly, is a group exhibition featuring the work of seven artists -- Ayanna Dozier, Ilana Harris-Babou, Meena Hasan, Lucia Hierro, Catherine Opie, Chuck Ramirez, and Pacifico Silano. Exhibition Curator Jenny Gerow sat down with Ayanna Dozier and Pacifico Silano to discuss artistic process, archival material, and how dominant myths of the American dream shape us. The exhibition is on view at BRIC through April 30th.

The title of Ayanna Dozier’s debut New York solo show, “This Country Makes It Hard to Fuck,” reads like a rallying cry or lament (and comes from a song by the musician Fever Ray). The exhibition feels more like a meditation — on pleasure, bodies and how our culture mediates our relationships to both … read more by Jillian Steinhauer


Image: still from lovertits (2022), 16mm color film, 4 minutes

February 23rd

Maysles Cinema celebrates Third World Newsreel’s restoration of films by Camille Billops & James Hatch with a presentation of the first two installments from their “Family Trilogy”.

Dr. Ayanna Dozier will introduce the program by reading from a manuscript she’s working on about Camille Billops’s work. The screening will be followed by a post-screening discussion with Thomas Allen Harris and Nzingha Kendall, moderated by Dr. Ayanna Dozier!

Doors open at 6:30 PM at Maysles Documentary Center

February 2nd-March 11th

Microscope is very pleased to welcome Ayanna Dozier back to the gallery for her first solo exhibition titled “This Country Makes it Hard to Fuck.”

In new and recent works in celluloid film and film photography Dozier addresses, mostly through personal experience or through her performances for the camera, the way the media, culture, politics, and religion work to exert control over bodies and stifle sexuality. She foregrounds how Black femmes and other individuals of color are disproportionately targeted by these systems.

Opening Reception: Thursday February 2nd, 6-8pm.

Image: installation view of "This Country Makes it Hard to Fuck," 2023 at Microscope Gallery

Microscope is very pleased to present a conversation between Ayanna Dozier and scholar Brittnay L. Proctor In connection with Dozier’s current solo exhibition at the gallery “This Country Makes it Hard to Fuck,” featuring new works in film and film photography.

“Engaging with the Black feminist theory and poetics in Dozier’s work, the dialogue will examine the artist’s multidisciplinary practice … . At the center of the discussion lies oft-ignored sexual politics of alienation, desire, and hyper-sexualization of Black femmes that undergird the works on view.”

Recording is from February 22nd talk at Microscope Gallery.

February 11th-May 14th

Featured Artists: Ayanna Dozier, Amy Elkins, Melissa Joseph, Lydia McCarthy, Triton Mobley, Steve Pauley, Sasha Rudensky, and Rob Swainston + Zorawar Sidhu

Crisis of Image features artists who resist the call for image erasure and instead develop new strategies for the production of visuality. Rather than seeking to escape the image or even to create new images, they explore the methods, access, and means of visual creation.

Curated by Jacob Rhodes, Kris Racaniello, and Lisa Schilling with a catalog essay by Kirsten Gill.

January 26th-April 30th

When I Am Empty is a group exhibition curated by Jenny Gerow featuring the work of seven artists – Ayanna Dozier, Ilana Harris-Babou, Meena Hasan, Lucia Hierro, Catherine Opie, Chuck Ramirez, and Pacifico Silano – who explore the dominant myths of the American dream that govern and shape our personal narratives.

These artists use advertising’s strategies toward generating want and desire, and through photography, video, and collage, use it as a viable tool for new meaning making in contemporary art. The title of the exhibition comes from a prompt from the manufacturer on a Whatacup beverage container. Enlarged by the photographer Chuck Ramirez to bodily proportions, the empty cup and phrase in this particular moment takes on a new interpretation, drawing attention to the spent, drained, state of Americans physically and mentally.

Image: still from Forever Your Girl (2022), Super 8mm color film, 7 minutes

January 30th

Artist Carrie Schneider joins Rail contributor Ayanna Dozier for a conversation. We conclude with a poetry reading by Aristilde Kirby.

Hosted by The Brooklyn Rail

December 16th

The Poetics of Criticism invites a gathering of Black femme critics to be in conversation about the contours and nuances of contemporary arts writing at the museum. Dually inspired by the unfiltered framework of Lois Weaver’s The Long Table format and the beautifully discursive, intersectional ebbs and flows of Black feminist kitchen table sessions, the Poetics of Criticism is curious about the evolving role of the Black femme critic. Our participants begin with our audience. What questions will you ask of us? Our invited guests include: Darla Migan, Jessica Lynne, Ayanna Dozier, Re’al Christian, Erica N. Cardwell, and Lee Ann Norman.

6:30-8:00 PM EST at Leslie-Lohman Museum

December 9th-January 13th

Fragment Gallery is pleased to present "A Room Full of Mirrors," a group exhibition curated by Alexander Shchurenkov of new and recent works by artists Quinci Baker, April Bey, Beni Bischof, Kim Dacres, Ayanna Dozier, Alanna Fields, Kang Seung Lee, Stef Van Looveren, Joiri Minaya, Ekaterina Muromtseva, Victor Ubah, Luis Xertu, and Justin Yoon.

For many centuries, portraiture has been perceived as an act of vanity and at the same time preservation of individual or family legacy, and thus — an archive of social history. Often related to colonial history and its repercussions, museums and private mansions filled with portraits from floor to ceiling are at the same time monuments to oppression and the dominance of the patriarchal system.

December 3rd

Content Warning comments on a variety of issues facing Black women's access to reproductive health care and sexual assault therapy. Culled from personal anecdotes and memory, I film several performers recounting my experiences with sexual justice to an audience. The sound is removed to enable me to provide audio via a live reverse lip sync. By having the same performer voice this archive of moving images of other performers, I aim to destabilize the singular status of assault testimony.

Performers in film: Jodie Lynn-Kee-Chow and Helina Metaferia

10 PM EST performance start, 8PM full program start at 718 Studios (130 Thames Street, Brooklyn)

October 4th-24th

Womxn in Windows’ 4th annual public exhibition comes to New York and Los Angeles in the month of October. This year's exhibition takes on a different format to past years. From Windows to Digital Billboards, Screenings, Performances and a Print Campaign.

Based on interdisciplinary artist and performer Kilo Kish’s latest music album of the same name; 𝘈𝘮𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘎𝘶𝘳𝘭 the public exhibition shows “...the idea of the American girl is far from singular,” says Zehra Ahmed - founder and curator of Womxn in Windows.

Softer is available to watch via a QR code in this year's print campaign across midtown Manhattan.

September 20th-26th

Solomon Riley Presents Negro Coney Island (2021) will play as part of Spectral Grounds, Black Experimental Film (September 20-26, 2022, a screening of moving image works by Black women and nonbinary filmmakers across generations from the dispersed territories of the Black diaspora—continental and otherwise.

September 23rd

WATERPROOF
A look into the polarizing attributes of Water as a conduit in the Black experience. Water can be all things catastrophic—a burial, an ending, humanity's evolving transporter through time and space—while cradling life as we know it. Water's vitality remains a touchstone for Black filmmakers, often channeling a spiritual connection centered between scenes. Waterproof visualizes Water's historical importance to Black life, reframed by these filmmakers and concluding with an essay film compiled by Melissa Lyde. ‍

9:30 PM EDT at Arverne Cinema

August 8th

Artist Tiona Nekkia McClodden joins Brooklyn Rail contributor Ayanna Dozier for a conversation. We conclude with a poetry reading Asiya Wadud. Recording (with transcript/captions) available via the link.

Hosted by Brooklyn Rail

August 4th

MINDFIELDS #1 - INSURRECTION IN THE MAGIC KINGDOM: BLONDE DEATH + CAPTAIN EEYORE
Doors 8 / Screening 8:30
Introduced by former Disneyland employee Dr. Ayanna Dozier

Blonde Death, James Dillinger (James Robert Baker), 1984, 93 min, SD video
Captain Eeyore, One of the Space Mountain ride operators, 1987, 15 min, multigeneration VHS dub

July 24th

“Alfreda's Cinema presents God is with you, a portal into Afro-spirituality through poetic cinema, and an expression of truth in spiritual warfare, featuring representations of Ifa, Hoodoo, Afro-Hinduism, and Afro-Catholicism.”—Melissa Lyde, curator. Featuring: Ebbò by Yelaine Rodriguez, The Diary of an African Nun by Julie Dash, Alice Coltrane: Black Journal by St. Clair Bourne, Pilgrim by Cauleen Smith, and Maman Brigitte by Ayanna Dozier.

June 9th-July 15th

Microscope Gallery is very pleased to present “Subtle Subversions,” a group exhibition of new and recent works by artists Ayanna Dozier, Morrison Gong, Bang Geul Han, Africanus Okokon, Demetrius Oliver, Vanessa Gully Santiago, and Andrew Paul Woolbright.

Although varying widely in terms of artistic medium and approach, the works in painting, sculpture, installation, photography, and mixed-media challenge and defy prevalent customs, societal controls and power structures, through subtle, poetic, and highly personal means. Together, the multi-layered and nuanced works allude to both the harmfulness as well as the absurdity of various entrenched societal, corporate, and governmental norms, policies, and laws — especially those related to privacy, body autonomy, and racial, gender, and sexual discrimination. Furthermore, the works collectively reflect upon the manners in which various technologies are used to monitor activities, sway perceptions, and maintain or alter the status quo.

June 24th

A lecture video, for subversive records (independent feminist and queer art research collective based in Japan), I introduce various artists and examine the queer history present in a black feminist film aesthetic. The talk is intended to be an introduction to the history of black feminist films, where various experimental practices have been developed.

May 25th-June 6th

For "The History of that Body" online film program

May 5th

Decoding Stigma and Parsons Design & Technology host Dozier for a discussion about her scholarly and artistic practice, which "seeks to uncover how systems intersect to target sex workers of color, specifically Black femmes"—and the fabulation and counter-archives that can help unmake them. Moderated by Decoding Stigma co-founder Livia Foldes.

May 7th

Curated in wave 9: "in the prison of his days / teach the free man how to praise" at Maysles Documentary Center, Harlem, NY at 3:30 PM

March 4th

"Flesh to Spirit" explores the manifold ways that film artists have embraced abstract techniques and explored the materiality of film and video to represent Black experience, from the 1960s to the present. Charting connections between several generations of moving-image makers, "Flesh to Spirit" will showcase brilliant works in 16mm and 35mm film, analog and digital video. From Paige Taul’s After DeCarava, which treats photographic abstraction as a form of care, to Ayanna Dozier’s Maman Brigitte, which connects Black women’s bodily autonomy to the contingency and texture of analog film, the films in "Flesh to Spirit" propose alternative potentialities in film and life alike.

March 23rd

Scholar, curator, artist, and Batman expert Ayanna Dozier, Ph.D., joins us to talk about the Caped Crusader and queer comic history. We chat about volcel Batman in The Batman, Prince and Kim Basinger fucking on tape during the '89 soundtrack recording sessions, Andy Warhol and Jack Smith's Batman, and more.

Scholar, curator, and artist Ayanna Dozier, Ph.D., joins us for a two-part episode that begins with a discussion about front-of-house museum work prompted by the recent attack at the MoMA Film Desk. What does cultural labor really entail? What protections do workers have? How do architecture, outsourcing, and management trends shape workplace culture?

April 2nd-3rd

Curated by scholar and artist Ayanna Dozier, this two-part program considers the legacy of 1920s Black cultural producers across the 20th and 21st centuries. It is programmed in conjunction with the exhibition James Van Der Zee’s Photographs: A Portrait of Harlem. Special thanks to Ayanna Dozier for her insights and expertise.

February 26th

During this Open Studios event, meet the artists participating in Session One of the Winter Workspace and see what they've been working on over the last eight weeks. Visitors can learn about the artists' practice, sources and materials. Explore each artist studio, see new and in-process work inspired by Wave Hill and created on site, and meet other art-lovers.