About this Event
Sonorous Somatics: The Worlds Beyond #013
Sonorous Somatics: Corey Wilkes
A live musical encounter with What Shall I Do With My Dead? at Blanc Gallery
Blanc Gallery welcomes acclaimed Chicago trumpeter, composer and improviser Corey Wilkes and his band for an evening of live music in conversation with What Shall I Do With My Dead?, an exhibition by Raja’Nee and Jalen Hamilton.
The performance forms part of Sonorous Somatics, a sound and listening series curated by BSA Gold in response to Blanc Gallery's exhibition program. For each exhibition, Gold invites musicians and sound artists to engage critically with the themes of the work, creating sonic environments that extend and deepen the conversations taking place within the gallery. The series opens new pathways between artistic disciplines, fostering a space for collective exploration, experimentation and listening.
Taking its title from a poem by Ntozake Shange, What Shall I Do With My Dead? brings together family photographs, historical documents and textile works to explore intergenerational memory, Black family histories and the possibilities of the archive. Moving between preservation and reimagination, Raja’Nee and Jalen Hamilton consider how we might honour those who came before us, and how the traces of their lives might become material for imagining new futures.
For this edition of Sonorous Somatics, Wilkes brings his expansive musical language into dialogue with the exhibition's explorations of memory, loss and continuity. Moving between jazz, electronic music and soulful expression, his practice embraces improvisation as a space of experimentation, collaboration and possibility.
An Emmy Award-winning composer and internationally acclaimed trumpeter, Wilkes has performed and recorded with artists including the Art Ensemble of Chicago, Roy Hargrove, Roy Ayers, Mavis Staples, Jon Batiste and Jennifer Hudson. His multidisciplinary practice has also brought him into collaboration with visual artists including Theaster Gates, Nick Cave and Rashid Johnson.
Through this encounter, Sonorous Somatics invites audiences to consider how sound might offer new ways of engaging with the histories we inherit, the memories we carry and the futures we imagine.
Event venue & nearby stays
4445 S King Dr, 4445 South King Drive, Chicago, United States
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