‘It’s Not Because It’s Not There, That It Isn ’t There’
Visibility and invisibility within Black flamenco performance
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21687760 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Amy Schofield (0000-0002-0689-9497, The Ohio State University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2023 |
| Volume | 28 |
| Issue | 5 |
| Pages | 34-40 |
| Publication date | 2023-07-04 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Performance Research (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1352-8165 • E-ISSN: 1469-9990 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/13528165.2023.2321060 |
| OpenAlex | W4396911039 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 5 |
Since flamenco's inception, the art form has served as an act of resilience and resistance for marginalized peoples, and now, more than ever before, Black flamenco artists are gaining greater visibility, engaging with the form as embodied activism and interrogation of present and historical injustices. Pointing to the various techniques Black flamenco artists employ to interrogate notions of visibility and invisibility within their performances, this article draws from performance studies, dance studies and Africana studies to analyse the four short films that were created as work-in-progress investigations for London-born Black flamenco artist Yinka Esi Graves's The Disappearing Act (2023). Employing Tavia Nyong'o's theory of afro-fabulation, I examine the myriad ways the piece negotiates Black presence and camouflage within spaces haunted by Spain's role in the Trans-Atlantic slave trade and looks to the archive to reach into the past, collapse time and imagine futures. In framing The Disappearing Act as an act of afro-fabulation that negotiates Black presence and visibility within flamenco through a trans-temporal engagement with archival information, I argue that the work refuses the invisibilization of Blackness and Black bodies in flamenco's past, present and future. Choreographic analysis and analytical movement description allow me to examine the ways Graves's site-specific work negotiates truth and untruth within what GerShun Avilez terms spatial justice as her physical body serves as trans-temporal marker of the violence associated with histories of chattel slavery. Finally, I highlight the recently formed Black Flamenco Network – Flamencos Unidos Africanos y Afro Descendientes (BFN – FUAAD) to illustrate how contemporary Black flamenco artists are seeking greater representation via community support and online, intergenerational collaboration
Aesthetics · Art · Invisibility · Optics · Physics · Visibility · Visual arts · Music History and Culture · Race, History, and American Society · Theater, Performance, and Music History
| Highly cited | No |
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