Tracing Obsolescence: Evelyn Owen, Dana Whabira, and Neelika Jayawardane Thursday, September 6, 2018 6:308pm ICI Curatorial Hub 401 Broadway, Suite 1620 FREE and open to the public Organized in collaboration with apexart, artist Dana Whabira, curator Evelyn Owen, and writer Neelika Jayawardane will speak about the exhibition Tracing Obsolescence., which explores the fleeting nature of so much of modern life: as consumer goods become outdated and are replaced, factories and mines close, their activities are outsourced, offshored, or become redundant. Despite efforts to “reduce, reuse, or recycle,” throwaway culture is entrenched. Dana Whabiras research-based spatial practice incorporates found materials from across Zimbabwe, which are embedded with personal, economic and historical significance. The cultural materials or social politicized sites are researched, archived, negated, reversed, and affirmed then transformed in attempt to question both colonial and personal constructs. Through her work she revisits the physical/cultural landscape to recontextualize meaning and narrative beyond binaries that have been pre-inscribed through controlling power structures. In recent work, Whabira has used discarded dress forms, the last vestiges of Zimbabwes declining clothes industry, to explore alienated labor in the nexus of global migration, capitalism and crises. These abandoned objects point to the rise of automation and the fall of machinery, technology and people that have become redundant or terminated. In this talk, Whabira will discuss her artistic practice and the work included in the exhibition Tracing Obsolescence with curator Evelyn Owen and writer Neelika Jayawardane. Tracing Obsolescence will be on view at apexart September 8 – October 27, 2018 located at 291 Church St. New York, NY 10013. This event is free and open to the public. To attend, please RSVP to rsvp@curatorsintl.org with OBSOLESCENCE in the subject line. Click here to listen to the talk. 
This event is accessible to people with mobility disabilities. Please contact ICI for additional accessibility needs. This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with City Council, and the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. 
