3AP: Denenge: Camo Coat v2: The Garden Collection

Afrofuturity opens portals to ever-unfolding constellations of possibility in representation and empowerment. 2024 heralds the start of Octavia Butler’s prophetic sci-fi novel, "Parable of the Sower," a text by which artist Denenge has long been inspired in teaching and practice. In honor of this moment at the story’s beginning, Denenge plans to develop "Camo Coat v2: The Garden Collection," a series of abstracted, kaleidoscopic textiles that engage the significance of this text through photographic commemoration of sites, specifically gardens both formal and personal. "This project centers the creative work of Black women like Butler who have planted seeds of freedom dreams and paved the way for liberation theories and global postcolonial movements rooted in holistic traditions and in the matrilineal adventures and badassery from which I am descended by blood and by choice."
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Works Featured and Photo Credits:
- Denenge is wearing the Moon Goddess Chicago-Specific Camo Coat featuring details of skyline as viewed from historic Bronzeville and puff sleeves with Lurie Garden wild flowers and bees.
- Camo Coat Collection, stills and runway video by Jonathan Woods, 02.02.2020
- Denenge in Original Camo Coat, Lurie Garden, photo by Hillary Higgins for Chicago Tribune, 2018
- Osanyin Commemorative Portrait Series, featuring Abegunde and Kali-Ahset Amen, Atlanta, GA, 2014
- Adinkra Cloth Belonging to Asantehene Agyeman Prempeh I, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC
- AFRIFUTURI 02022020 limited edition monograph for runway collection launch, holograms in collaboration with by C Alex Clark
- Wan Chuku and the Mystical Yam Farm, WAKATI: Time Shapes African Art, curated by Moyo Okediji, Oklahoma State University, Museum of Art, 2015-16
- La Fantaisie Ibeji, experimental performance film with footage from Wan Chuku and the Mystical Yam Farm, Super Space Riff, Alter-Destiny 888
- Shipwrecked Sailor Snake and Camo Coat Sun Goddess, textile for augmented reality interactive project with Senongo Akpem, Pixel Fable, 2017-present, and also utilized for Camo Coat Sun Goddess robe, 2020
- Pastoral Brutalism, Apartment 19 video installation at La Becque Art Residency, La Tour-de-Peilz, Switzerland, 2022
- Felicia Holman as time traveler in Underground Railroad map-inspired silk garment, Ma(s)king Her, Honey Pot Performance, photos by Tonika Johnson, headdress, capes, and oracle sculptures for Pritzker Pavilion performance, Millennium Park, Chicago, 2016