Saturday, February 8, 4PM

A.I.R. Gallery (155 Plymouth Street)

Held in conjunction with I woke up dreaming., the 16th A.I.R. Biennial, this reading features Aristilde Kirby, Funto Omojola, and Monica Uszerowicz. Reflecting on themes from the Biennial, the event explores the vulnerability of forming real-life intimacies amidst the tension between digital entanglements and analog experiences. With dreams serving as a metaphor for reconciling the real and imagined, the readings reflect on how language—written, spoken, or expressed through the body—navigates the delicate terrain of connection.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS:

Aristilde Kirby is a Black poet and performance artist. She is the author of Daisy & Catherine² (Auric Press, 2022). Originally from the Bronx, New York, Kirby currently resides in Brooklyn, New York, also known as Lenapehoking.

Funto Omojola is a Nigerian-American writer, performer, and visual artist. They are the author of If I Gather Here and Shout (2024), winner of the Nightboat Poetry Prize, and founder of PrayerRoom, a virtual asynchronous prayer circle and participatory art project.

Monica Uszerowicz is a Brooklyn-born writer, editor, and photographer. She was previously the Senior Editor at Cultured and her writing has been published in The Believer, Bomb, Burnaway, The Los Angeles Review of Books, The New York Review of Books, and Pin-Up, among others. She was a 2020 recipient of The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts Writer Grant in support of Groundwater, an ongoing essay series about artists from Florida and the Caribbean whose work addresses--or attempts to mitigate--environmental injustice and the effects of the climate crisis.