Would you say your art is about being a black American?No. Well, I guess it just depends on my mood.—Afro-Futurist artist Hebru Brantley, responding to a question in a 2011 Reader interview
As Dery points out in the introduction to his 1993 interview collection Black to the Future, Afro-Futurism is a logical means of expression because “African Americans, in a very real sense, are the descendants of alien abductees; they inhabit a sci-fi nightmare in which unseen but no less impassable force fields of intolerance frustrate their movements: official histories undo what has been done; and technology is too often brought to bear on black bodies (branding, forced sterilization, the Tuskegee experiment, and tasers come readily to mind).”
But then along comes J—a being from the distant future who’s apparently taken over the body of a 20-year-old janitor (“This chassis is my ride,” he tells Ames) in order to earn points toward a mysterious “golden ticket” to ultimate freedom. What specifically caused Edgar Miguel Sanchez’s dancerly J to wash up at AACBR—and why nobody throws him out given how crazy he acts—remain unsolved questions. But he soon enough becomes an Ariel to old Ames’s Prospero in their common struggle for liberation.
Through 6/21: Tue-Thu 7:30 PM, Fri 8 PM, Sat 2 and 8 PM, Sun 2 PM Goodman Theatre 170 N. Dearborn 312-443-3800goodmantheatre.org $10-$40
