Filmmaker and video installation artist Isaac Julien first gained international attention in the 1980s for his provocative feature films, documentaries and experimental video works exploring black and gay identities. His multiscreen installations often unite elements from dance, painting, sculpture, theater, and music and include Ten Thousand Waves, Vagabondia, Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Mask, Long Road to Mazatlan, and Lessons of the Hour. He has had solo exhibitions at Rio de Janeiro, Mexico City, the De Pont Museum, Art Institute of Chicago, and many more. Julien is Distinguished Professor of the Arts at the University of California Santa Cruz, where he and Professor Mark Nash established the Isaac Julien Lab.

ARI Faculty Fellowship Project: Statues Never Die centers on Alain Locke, one of the most important African American thinkers of the black arts. The multi-screen film installation will explore the vital place that Locke articulated for African art in the philosophy of the Harlem Renaissance and explore its relevance today in relation to contemporary debates around museums and their collections. In what Julien terms “poetic restitution” the project will give a deeper understanding of how we think about contemporary art and culture.  

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