2020: This Is Not An Ally (Manchester School of Art Research Hub event)

THIS IS NOT AN ALLY

The Treachery of Images (Magritte 1929)

Performance-lecture 7 July 2020 Roundtable event, Manchester School of Art Dr Kai Syng Tan FRSA SFHEA T: @kaisyngtan @wesatonamat

THIS IS NOT AN ABSTRACT This performance-lecture is developed from a talk I gave at Live Art Developmental Agency, Summer 2019. It is on performative allyship, privilege, oppression Olympics, re-centring whiteness, labour, biases and hypocrisies of the UK arts industry and arts HE that BLM is exposing, although none of this is new. Allyship is earned, not claimed, and not through reading a few books, or shoving black squares to silence discourse but staying silent/not doing the work (because POC are less busy), or parading non-white bodies in programmes as ‘radical’ ‘feminists’ and ‘accomplices’ who’re quick to ‘call out’ on injustices, but are yet routinely exploiting & underpaying POC /migrants/queers/whoever will up their middle-class neuro-hetero-normative street cred and replicating and playing way dirtier neo-capitalist/patriarchal/etc tricks. I will draw on readings, examples and observations as a non-white, neurodivergent artist-curator and academic who has worked with many 'allies’. This is under-discussed, and is insidious and prevalent, as we pride ourselves to be 'liberal’.

IT’S A JOKE

THIS IS NOT MY PROBLEM

I’ve never talked about race in my work.

Why should I? It’s not my problem.

THIS IS A JOKE

WHYCAN’T YOU TAKE JOKES

IT’S JUST BANTER

WHY SO GRUMPY WHY ARE YOU HERE IF SO GRUMPY WHY ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT RACE WHY DON’T YOU TALK ABOUT RACE

By Seerut K. Chawla Instagram @seerutkchawla

SILENCE IS VIOLENCE

31 May 2020 St Peter’s Square

RACIST JOKES

Blackout Tuesday 3 June 2020

RACIST JOKES

Black Square (Kazimir Malevich, 1915)

THIS IS A WHITE SAVIOUR

WHERE ARE THEY WHEN YOU NEED THEM

(TO CLEAN UP THEIR OWN S***) https://tinyurl.com/y6seq9vu

MY WHITE SAVIOUR DATE

HITS & MISSES NITS & KISSES ZITS & HISSES

PUB QUIZ: CAN YOU PRONOUNCE

kai syng tang bame

SHADES OF GREY/ TAN/ BROWN/BLACK

HIGH

ART JOKES DAY GLOW

https://twitter.com/Cioconnor/status/1159895452118081536 https://www.museumsassociation.org/museums-journal/news/15082019-tate-apologises-wheelchair-user-slams-lack-of-access

WHAT IS YOUR RESEARCH QUESTION? • • • • • • • • • • • •

Are UK art schools racist? How racist are UK art schools?

How racist is the UK arts sector?

How racist is the UK live/disability arts sector?

How racist is art education and art history?

Why can’t white people stop ‘whitesplaining’ racism to poc?

Why can’t white feminists stop explaining what feminism/democracy really is?

How diverse is ‘neurodiversity’?

Why’re you working with them? They just want to fix you.

Why don’t you let me fix you (for £250 a day)?

Why aren’t you happy with £X? Where’s my bonus?

Why is your work so niche? Why is your work so risky?

Why is my professor still not black? Are you really a prof?

Why aren’t you angrier/more submissive/better in X? Why are/aren’t you painting squares?

THESE ARE NOT ALLIES EITHER

THE PERSISTENCE/RESISTENCE

OF MEMORY (LEST WE FORGET) The Persistence of Memory (Dali 1931)

YOU’RE STILL NOT AN ALLY

JUST BECAUSE YOU’VE SAT THROUGH A PERFORMANCE-LECTURE ON ZOOM

THIS REMAINS A JOKE WE’RE BACK TO SQUARE ONE

AND I HAVE NO TIME FOR QUESTIONS/COMMENTS

THIS IS NOT AN ALLY

Performance-lecture 7 July 2020 Roundtable event, Manchester School of Art Dr Kai Syng Tan FRSA SFHEA T: @kaisyngtan @wesatonamat