In 2020 Hammonds House Museum will present exhibits and installations that examine “Blackness” and how the idea of blackness manifests itself in our collective consciousness. Addressing displacement, reinvention, and transformative change, Masud Olufani’s Translocation & Transfiguration opens on Friday, January 10 and will be on view through Sunday, March 22 at Hammonds House Museum, 503 Peeples Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30310.   
 
“Masud’s exhibition is the perfect way to start the year with thought-provoking art which speaks to our history and the many ways we’ve thrived in this country, but how we are still dealing with systemic inequity and injustice,” says Leatrice Ellzy, Executive Director of Hammonds House Museum.
 
From the Artist:
Translocation & Transfiguration explores how the social complication of “blackness” in America has served as a catalyst for the creative brilliance, cultural inventiveness, and spiritual resilience characteristic of the African diaspora.  The artwork also looks at the objectification, marginalization and commodification of the black body, and how the sustained multigenerational trauma visited upon it necessitated a set of subversive practices and responses to ensure survival.
 
Through mixed media installations of sculpture, drawing, sound, video, photography, and text, the artist investigates how philosophical transference is manifested in the struggle of the African American community, and how modalities for survival can serve as touchstones of inspiration to a society fragmented by racism, sexism and extreme expressions of nationalism.
 
Masud Olufani is an Atlanta based multidisciplinary artist, actor and writer. He is a graduate of Morehouse College and the Savannah College of Art and Design where he received an M.F.A. in sculpture in 2013. His work has been featured in group and solo exhibitions nationally and internationally. He is the recipient of numerous grants and awards, including a South Art Prize state fellowship; a MOCA Working Artist Project Grant; and a Southwest Airlines Art and Social Engagement Grant. He is currently an Artist in Residence at the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center. His writing has been featured in Scalawag Magazine, Burnaway, Bahai Teachings, and he was a contributing writer for the Jacob Lawrence Struggle Series catalogue published by the Peabody Essex Museum. He is the co-host of Retro Report on PBS, a primetime investigative news show that analyzes news events through the lens of history.
 
Hammonds House Museum is generously supported by the Fulton County Board of Commissioners, Fulton County Arts & Culture, and the City of Atlanta Mayor’s Office of Cultural Affairs.