Misogynoir describes the uniquely co-constitutive racialized and sexist violence that befalls Black women as a result of their simultaneous and interlocking oppression at the intersection of racial and gender marginalization. - Moya Bailey

MMoCA

Doesn't Care Protect us Serve us Listen

An open letter and living archive made in collective (re:)action from Black women, femmes, and gender non-conforming artists harmed by the 2022 Wisconsin Triennial Exhibition at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art.

Read the Open Letter

8/24/22: Read the Museum’s First Statement.

9/15/22: Read the Museum’s Second Statement.

9/20/22: Watch the Black Women Artists Speak Panel.

10/24/23: Read the press statement announcing MMoCA’s director’s resignation.

We, the collective

 of Artists from the 2022 Wisconsin Triennial Call For:

Formal Apologies

Both public and private, from leadership individually (i.e. Christina Brungardt, the Museum, and the Board)

Contract & Policy Review

Thorough review of artists’ contracts and museum policies, and acknowledgement of Museum’s breach of contract and policy

Recognition

Acknowledgment of poorly supported exhibition, related programming, and recognition that the museum was ill-equipped to host this exhibition

Public Plan

Share a plan of action, naming steps to ensure that the public and artists are safe within this institution

Future Commitment

Inclusivity efforts for future generations, particularly for Black women, femmes, and gender non-conforming artists, within their programming

DEI/IDEA Audit

Commit to publish and share a publicly available DEI/IDEA audit of the museum

Financial Restitution

Recognition of emotional and professional damages, with priority given to Lilada Gee

 

Termination

Of Christina Brungardt, and all others in leadership directly responsible for decisions on communications

Non-Retaliation

Immediate written promise of no retaliation (employment, financial, legal, etc.) against Fatima Laster, Annik Dupaty, or Charlotte Cummins, or any artists involved in this exhibition

Collaboration

A commitment from the museum to work with artists interested in drafting any next steps as paid consultants

Conversation

Open-to-the-public conversation with artists regarding their work and experiences

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“In this other life, she would not be required to take all the shit that no one else would accept and pretend to be grateful.” ― Saidiya Hartman, Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Riotous Black Girls, Troublesome Women, and Queer Radicals
“For how does one overthrow, change or even challenge a system that you have been taught to admire, to love, to believe in?” ― bell hooks, Ain't I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism
We cannot sit on our behinds waiting for someone else to do it for us. We must save ourselves. — Mary Ann Weathers, “An Argument for Black Women’s Liberation as a Revolutionary Force,” 1969
Black women and Black nonbinary, agender, and gender-variant folks negotiate misogynoir in a myriad of ways... they are able to achieve liberatory praxis through digital alchemy that can actually transform misogynoir into something useful.
“But I am really saying something very simple. The will of the people, or the state, is revealed by the state's institutions. There was not, then, nor is there, now, a single American institution, which is not a racist institution… Yes: we have lived through tokens and concessions but white power remains white. And what it appears to surrender with one hand it obsessively clutches in the other.” ― James Baldwin, Dark Days
"I don't know what most white people in this country feel, but I can only include what they feel from the state of their institutions." — James Baldwin on The Dick Cavett Show (May 16, 1969)