Laila Islam
BFA Curatorial Studies
Artist Statement
"Somatic Utopic Imagining" explores how pedagogies exercised in creative spaces as art practices can create healing environments for communities who experience systemic harm. A pedagogy developed by Laila Islam and Reva Rutherford, Utopic Imagining is a practice where one imagines, designs and creates alternative realities that better serve Black and Brown communities. Utopic Imagining is an Afrofuturist method of speculating the past, present and future, imagining a utopia, and designing technologies that support one's envisioned utopia. Somatic Pedagogy offers resistance to our violent capitalist environment by encouraging people to assess their bodily relationship with capitalism and how it manifests socially in our interpersonal relationships. Through therapeutic group practices, soma encourages deeper relationships with one's individual body as well as the collective body, ultimately embodying a healing state.
Utopic Imagining and Somatic Pedagogy were used throughout The Future Is Us (TFIU) Group Residency, a project where participants and facilitators engaged in both healing pedagogies. Throughout this project, participants were encouraged to create conscious relationships with their bodies and their communities through speculative and imaginative practices. Exercises included group breathwork and writing, open discussions, collaging, and art making that was body focused and play centered. The findings generated by—and the works created from—TFIU Group Residency participants and facilitators resulted in a zine. This zine, Somatic Utopic Imagining Vol. 1, is intended for use as a pedagogical tool, enabling readers to use our works as a reference for how communities can collectively process trauma, share knowledge, and create together through Somatic Pedagogy and Utopic Imagining.
Explore the virtual exhibition.
IMAGE GALLERY
Click through to enlarge and view individual artworks from Laila's thesis project.
