Curatorial note
For Edition IX – Bodies and Technologies the grassroots media collective Black Speaks Back was invited to create a new film and podcast project, which has taken the title Zwarte Ibis: The Spirit of Black Intimacies. Built upon an interview-based creative methodology called the ‘Kitchen Table Talk’ method, the project tackles issues of hyper-sexualisation, cultural fragmentation and collective remembrance at the boundaries between intimacy and sexuality, freedom and conditioning, and myth and reality.
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I. Research: Enacting the ‘Kitchen Table Talk’ Method
Black Speaks Back, Zwarte Ibis: Preliminary Experiments (2022), performance presentation for the If I Can’t Dance Edition IX – Bodies and Technologies Introductory Event, Amsterdam. Photo: Maarten Nauw.
The research section serves as a landing pad for visitors to orient themselves. With the three posts — including ‘The Kitchen Table Talk’, ‘On Intimacy’ and ‘On Carrie Mae Weems’ — it maps out some key coordinates in the Black Speaks Back (BSB) thinking and gathering processes. Beginning with a brief introduction to their primary research methodology, the posts then open out to share preliminary observations on the topic of intimacy, as well as the on artistic departure point for their method.
II. Writing: Developing the Storyline
On the left: Zwarte Ibis scriptwriting team on the first day of their February residency in the CBK Zuidoost’s BijlmAIR residency programme; from left to right: Smita James, Chris (Ci) Rickets, Emma-Lee Amponsah; Alexine Gabriela, Nohely Koeyers. On the right: Exterior view of the brightly painted Heesterveld Creative Community building where the studio for the CBK Zuidoost BijlmAIR residency programme is located.
For the first two weeks of February 2023 members of Black Speaks Back (BSB) convened at the Heesterveld studio of CBK Zuidoost as part of the centre’s BijlmAIR residency programme. In those 14 days together, they reviewed and discussed topics that had emerged during the Kitchen Table Talk gatherings in 2022; they danced; they watched films; they wrote and sketched; they imagined toward the storyline of Zwarte Ibis. In the three posts below, BSB opens up their Instagram story archive from the residency period, sharing smaller and bigger moments from what they came to call their “writer’s camp” alongside reference materials for studio visitors interested to learn more about (Black) cinematic traditions.
III. Realisation: Making the Film
Casting call Instagram announcement posted by Black Speaks Back on 6 July 2023.
ZWARTE IBIS was filmed over six days across five locations. The first four days unfolded within the scope of another stay in the CBK Zuidoost’s BijlmAIR residency space, this time for four weeks between August and September 2023. What had been the gathering point for BSB’s writer’s camp in February, the Heesterveld studio now served as a homebase for storing props (such as the door that appears throughout the film) and other on-set needs (snacks, drinks, basic tools, and so on). Over those six days, around fifty or sixty cast and crew members gathered from across networks around the Netherlands with a few coming even from Belgium. In early July, a call had been put out through the Black Speaks Back social media channels, and community members had responded. There was a number of roles to be filled: a dancer, an elder, a teenager, a child between five and ten years old, and many extras of all shades and all ages 18-50. Much of the crew also connected through the call and particular positions were culled together from the collective members’ personal networks. A collaboration with the technical production team of La Fam was set up early on, filling the roles of director of photography, camera operator and gaffer. Slowly over the summer, the cast and crew positions were all filled.
Alongside the search for people, location scouting was also underway through August. With one of the locations already secured (in the Heesterveld studio of the BijlmAIR programme), the other four eventually settled to be: a Tungsten Studio in Broek in Waterland; What is Happening Here, a former bank space turned underground art gallery near Rembrandtplein in Amsterdam; CREA theater at the University of Amsterdam; and a strip of beach in Wijk aan Zee. All of the locations came with their own challenges, but the atmosphere of the communities of people who gathered brought a warmth to each, which was felt by everyone on set. In the following four posts, studio visitors can have a look inside the six filming days as they were documented in the Black Speaks Back Instagram stories. The posts move around, some offering a view onto multiple days at a single location and others moving between different locations. Moving with the flows of energies on set, they give a sense of the different kinds of groups that gathered and a sneak peek behind-the-scenes into the filming of ZWARTE IBIS.
A ‘Zwarte Ibis’ Playlist
Londrelle, Intimacy, 3:38 (2018; Eternal Sunshine). ›››
Montell Jordan, This is How We Do It, 4:37 (1995; Rush Associated Labels, PMP, Def Jam Records). ›››
Childish Gambino, This is America, 3:45 (2018; McDJ, RCA Records). ›››
Kelela, Contact, 4:00 (2023; Warp Records). ›››
FKJ & Masego, Tadow, 8:06 (2018; EQT Recordings). ›››
Saweetie, Get It Girl, 2:45 (2021; HBO and Atlantic Record). ›››
Lenny Kravitz, Fly Away, 3:41 (1998; Virgin Records). ›››
Janelle Monáe, I Like That, 3:20 (2018; Wondaland, Bad Boy and Atlantic Records). ›››
Izaline Calister, Lamento di Mosa Nena, 4:55 (2006; Network Medien). ›››
Nicholas Britell, Agape from the If Beale Street Could Talk original motion picture score; 2:55 (2018; Lakeshore Records). ›››
Enter the Black Speaks Back Media Sphere
VIDEO
Take It From An Expert with poet, activist and cultural anthropologist Professor Gloria Wekker, released on occasion of the Belgian National Women’s Day, 2019. ›››
VIDEO
#MyHairStory, a disarming webisode series in which an intergenerational group of people share how they relate to their natural hair and reflect on their trajectory to get where they are now. ›››
VIDEO
EUphoria (2018), the world’s first Afrofuturist musical conceived and realised by 15 young Black artists in collaboration with Ghanaian-Romanian artist Wanlov the Kubolor. Available for streaming on the Pan African platform Kweli TV. ›››
VIDEO
A response to EUphoria (2018) with immediate impressions right after watching from poet, activist and cultural anthropologist Professor Gloria Wekker. ›››
VIDEO
Resisting Assimilation Violence (2019), part one of KREYOLIZATION (2019-ongoing), which is a series of experimental shorts presenting exploratory research about Black experiences in predominantly white spaces. ›››
VIDEO
Hacking the White Cube (2020), part two of KREYOLIZATION (2019-ongoing), which is a series of experimental shorts presenting exploratory research about Black experiences in predominantly white spaces. ›››
