As We Rise: Photography from the Black Atlantic
5 November 2024 - 20 January 2025
Book Now Admission: Starting from £6, a ticket will grant access to all three Winter Exhibitions.
Winter Exhibitions:
Anastasia Samoylova: Adaptation
As We Rise: Photography from the Black Atlantic
Aneesa Dawoojee: March of the Hummingbirds (ends 5 January)
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About
★★★★★ “Every image contains some kind of magic.” – The Guardian
★★★★★ “A triumph… just a small selection of the breadth of talent and vibrancy across the African diaspora, and it shines in allowing both the photographers and their respective subjects to speak their own truth.” – The Upcoming
AS WE RISE: PHOTOGRAPHY FROM THE BLACK ATLANTIC is an exciting exhibition of photographs from African Diasporic culture. Organised by Aperture and curated by Elliott Ramsey, the exhibition showcases work by Black artists from Canada, United States, Great Britain, The Caribbean, and the African Continent.
The exhibition celebrates the expansive sensibility of the works in the Wedge Collection, Canada’s largest privately-owned collection committed to championing Black artists, established by Dr. Kenneth Montague in 1997. Centring the familial alongside the familiar, the exhibition embraces concepts of community, identity, and power, and recognizes the complex strength, beauty, vulnerability, and diversity of Black life. The exhibition features such established names as Horace Ové, James Barnor and Gordon Parks, as well as emerging talents such as Texas Isaiah and Arielle Bobb-Willis.
AS WE RISE: PHOTOGRAPHY FROM THE BLACK ATLANTIC, selections from the Wedge Collection, is organized by Aperture and curated by Elliott Ramsey.
The accompanying book, As We Rise: Photography from the Black Atlantic (Aperture, 2021), a 184-page catalogue and As We Rise: Sounds from the Black Atlantic (Aperture, 2023), a limited-edition vinyl record, both published by Aperture, are available to purchase in the Gallery Shop and through Saatchi Store Online.
About Elliott Ramsey
Elliott Ramsey is Curator of The Polygon Gallery in Vancouver, Canada. Ramsey holds a Master of Arts in Comparative Media Arts (2015) from Simon Fraser University. Ramsey is an alumnus of the Association of Art Museum Curators’ Professional Alliance for Curators of Colour, and has sat on numerous panels, advisories, and art juries including the Sobey Award, VIVA Award, Portfolio Prize, and Capture Photography Festival, among various other committees.
About Dr Kenneth Montague, the Wedge Collection
The Wedge Collection was started in 1997 by Dr. Kenneth Montague to acquire and exhibit art that explores Black life. In addition to the Wedge Collection, Montague founded Wedge Curatorial Projects, a non-profit arts organization that helps support emerging Black artists. A Toronto-based art collector, Montague has been a member of the Art Gallery of Ontario’s Board of Trustees since 2015 and has served on the African acquisitions committee at Tate Modern, London, as well as on the Photography Curatorial Committee of the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto. He is also a Trustee of the Aperture Foundation, and a past member of the jury for the Scotiabank Photography Award, Canada’s largest photography prize. In 2016, Montague received an Honorary Doctorate from OCAD University, Toronto.
About Aperture
Established in 1952, Aperture is a non-profit publisher that leads conversations around photography worldwide. From its base in New York, Aperture connects global audiences and supports artists through its acclaimed quarterly magazine, books, exhibitions, digital platforms, public programs, limited-edition prints, and awards. Aperture champions photography’s vital role in nurturing curiosity and encouraging a more just, tolerant society.
