MOTHERSHIP TRILOGY

THE PAST – M1 was born out of questions surrounding national identity, race & xenophobia. Through the lens of Afrofuturism, the 10-min performances challenges traditional notions of race and gender. Most of the queries are rooted in the African diaspora with constant play in shifting viewpoints on the historical context of slave ownership and the revisionist theory of the Founding Fathers.

THE FUTURE  – M2 centers on speculative fiction and anti-colonialism to transport the viewer into a world filled with ritual, spirituality and indigenous practices. Simpson’s multimedia design draws upon Afrofuturism as a social movement to utilize Sun Ra’s “Space is the Place,” quote to imagine a future free from racial and gendered harm.

THE PRESENT – M3  is the Present Day. As Simpson explains, “I was particularly interested in Octavia E. Butler and her reasoning for writing stories for Black People in present day life. She was confronted with the question of why is it necessary to have Black Characters in her narratives even if extraterrestrials are omnipresent in science-fiction and made it a point to insert them into her futuristic stories.” M3 borrows from current events and social movements while interrogating actions around defamiliarizing what is socially familiar.