5.5 - Ayanna Dozier Artist Talk
5.5 - Ayanna Dozier Artist Talk
Join artist and writer Ayanna Dozier for a conversation about deconstructing and subverting media depictions of Black femme sex workers.
"When laws are rapidly being passed in which Black women will continue to be affected disproportionately by new means of policing, representation becomes critical. And as such, alternative media and the arts are vital for the production and distribution of counter-visual representations of sex work."
In a recent essay for Pioneer Works’ Broadcast, the Brooklyn-based filmmaker, photographer, and writer explores the potent liberatory potential for Black femme sex workers who "seize the means of their own representation" in the face of pervasive surveillance and criminalization.
Decoding Stigma and Parsons Design & Technology host Dozier for a discussion about her scholarly and artistic practice, which "seeks to uncover how systems intersect to target sex workers of color, specifically Black femmes"—and the fabulation and counter-archives that can help unmake them. Moderated by Decoding Stigma co-founder Livia Foldes.
Ayanna Dozier (PhD) is a Brooklyn-based filmmaker, photographer, and writer using performance and discourse to embody and challenge records of history. She is the author of Janet Jackson’s The Velvet Rope (2020). She was a 2022 Wave Hill Winter Workspace Resident, a 2018-2019 Helena Rubinstein Fellow in Critical Studies at the Whitney Independent Studies Program, and a Joan Tisch Teaching Fellow from 2017-2022 at Whitney Museum of American Art. Her work has been screened at Anthology Film Archives, The Shed, and the Block Museum amongst others. She currently teaches in the Department of Communication and Media Studies at Fordham University and is working on the manuscript of the life and work of abstract film and visual artist, Camille Billops.