The student population at the School of the Art Institute is just 3 percent black. “It’s very frustrating,” says Da’Niro Elle Brown, a senior who studies sculpture, performance, and film. “People put you with the other black people. They assume every black person loves Kara Walker or Basquiat. During critiques, if you’re black, you feel like people are expecting something from you. People assume your work is about you being black and that they can’t ask questions because they can’t identify. It’s stifling. We want to define ourselves, not let the mass of the community or the school tell us who we are or about the work we do.”
The art in the show itself, Brown says, reflects a wide range of media, styles, and experiences. “You’ll see a lot of representation of the queer spectrum,” she says. “People reference their upbringing and families, and the communities they belong to now.”
Brown herself is in two more shows this month, one of student work at SAIC’s Sullivan Galleries and a special exhibition of regional artists curated by Michelle Grabner at the stARTup Art Fair.
