MENOKIN DESCENDANT COLLECTIVE COLLABORATES WITH ARTIST DINEO BOPAPE ON EXHIBITION AT THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART IN NEW YORK

Artist Dineo Seshee Bopape holding clay at Menokin

For Immediate Release, June 15, Warsaw VA: The Menokin Foundation announced today a collaboration between the Menokin Descendant Collective and artist Dineo Seshee Bopape and The Museum of Modern Art in New York for the artist’s new exhibition, Projects: Dineo Seshee Bopape. The central work in this exhibition, the multichannel sound and video installation Lerato laka le a phela le a phela le a phela/My love is alive, is alive, is alive (2022), also incorporates soil, rock, and water. The exhibition will be on view in the Museum’s street-level gallery from July 1 through October 9, 2023.

The Menokin Descendant Collective, comprised of descendants of enslaved persons at Menokin, created small sculptures from Menokin landscape-sourced clay, where their ancestors had once lived in bondage. The clay was sent to over fifty participating descendants from across the country to create molds with their hands. The molds will travel to a kiln for firing and will be delivered to the artist for installation into the 2023 exhibition at MoMA.

“The Menokin Descendant Collective is deeply appreciative to Dineo Seshee Bopape for the invitation to participate in her upcoming exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.”, says Judith Gordon, a descendant of enslaved persons at Menokin and member, Menokin Board of Trustees, “Together, we will once again remember and honor our enslaved ancestors specifically, and broadly, all enslaved ancestors. Viewing Dineo’s work, we will be profoundly reminded of what our ancestors endured and of their contribution despite the most devastating circumstances. We are reminded of a people of extraordinary spiritual strength and the legacy this is for us, their descendants.

This artist collaboration with the descendants of enslaved persons at Menokin began during a recent show in Richmond, Virginia at the Institute of Contemporary Art Museum at Virginia Commonwealth University, and Bopape will include these and the newly created objects in the exhibition at MoMA.

MoMA Exhibition Information: The exhibition will be on view in the Museum’s street-level gallery from July 1 through October 9, 2023. For press materials please contact Olivia Oramas, olivia_oramas@moma.org.

Artist Bio: Dineo Seshee Bopape was born in the year of the golden rooster, 1981 on a Sunday. If she were Ghanaian, her name would be akosua/akos for short. Bopape lives in Southern Africa. She has shown her work internationally in numerous solo exhibitions, most recently in 2022 at Pirelli HangarBicocca, Milan; Ocean Space, Venice; and Secession, Vienna, and in 2021 at Institute for Contemporary Art at Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond. She co-represented South Africa at the Venice Biennial in 2019.

About the Menokin Descendant Collective: The Menokin Descendant Collective was founded in collaboration with the Menokin Foundation, following the First Menokin Descendants’ Day in 2022. Comprised of descendants of persons who were enslaved at Menokin and others closely related, the Descendant Collective aims to honor the humanity, sacrifice and resilience of the enslaved laborers who built and worked on Menokin. Monthly virtual meetings are held with goals of increasing membership across the country, contributing to the development and governance of the Menokin Foundation, and through research, illuminating the stories of the enslaved more accurately and fully to open doors of much needed racial healing. Find more information at https://www.menokin.org/descendants-overview

Menokin Descendant Collective Contact: Kiana Wilkerson; kwilkerson@menokin.org

About the Menokin Foundation: Menokin: The home of Francis Lightfoot Lee — a signer of the Declaration of Independence — is a National Historic Landmark and, like our country, built on the contradictions of slavery. It is one of the best documented 18th century houses in the United States. The Menokin Foundation was formed in 1994 in Warsaw with the mission of exploring the building of America through the Glass House Project. This innovative preservation approach juxtaposes the layers of what is remaining of the historic ruin with architectural glass. Views out onto the surrounding landscape offered through the glass walls continually connect visitors to the natural environment. This interplay of interior and exterior, historic past and modern-day perspective, offers a layered and complex look at the stories of people who lived here.

Menokin Foundation Press Contact: Michael Beller; mbeller@menokin.org

All images copyright and courtesy of the Institute of Contemporary Art at Virginia Commonwealth University and The Menokin Foundation, 2021-2023.