C. Davida Ingram: 2018 Jacob Lawrence Legacy Residency + Exhibition

C. Davida Ingram is the 2018 Jacob Lawrence Legacy Resident at the Jacob Lawrence Gallery, supported by an NEA Art Works grant. During the month of January, Ingram is developing new work that will be exhibited in A Book with No Pages, opening on February 6.

Ingram’s residency project focuses on venerating pioneering Seattle Black artists: Jacob Lawrence, Gwendolyn Knight Lawrence, James Washington, and Barbara Earl Thomas. Her process will include dialogues with community organizers, artists, and healers considering Black radical imagination and deeper dreaming of solidarity in the Trump era.

Beginning in 2015, the Jacob Lawrence Gallery made a commitment to dedicate every February — Black History Month — to artists and ideas of the African Diaspora. Originally conceived as an exhibition initiative, it quickly expanded to become an artist-in-residence program. HOWDOYOUSAYYAMINAFRICAN? and Steffani Jemison participated in 2015 and 2016 respectively. In 2017, to honor the 100th anniversary of Jacob Lawrence’s birth, the Gallery featured programming and an exhibition of the artist’s work.

Biography
C. Davida Ingram is a conceptual artist known for making subversive social inquiries. She is passionate about beauty and social justice, and her primary muses are race, gender, and social relationships. Her imagination focuses on the lives of Black femmes using a wide range of mediums — Craig’s list ads, drones, photography, gold grills, and more — to reshape what is possible in her own identification with being a Black queer woman. Ingram’s art has been shown at the Frye Art Museum, Northwest African American Museum, Evergreen College, Bridge Productions, Intiman Theater, Town Hall, and more. Her writings have been included in Arcade, Ms. Magazine blog, The James Franco Review, and The Stranger. Ingram received the 2014 Stranger Genius Award in Visual Arts. In 2016, she was a Neddy Artist Award finalist, a Kennedy Center Citizen Artist Fellow, and was voted one of the twenty most talented people in the city by Seattle Magazine.

Exhibition
A Book with No Pages
February 7–28, 2018
Jacob Lawrence Gallery
Opening: Tuesday, February 6, 5:30–9pm

About the Jacob Lawrence Gallery
The Jacob Lawrence Gallery is an inspiring space for exhibitions; a vital center for social interaction and dialog about art, art history, and design; and a critical para-educational resource for students and faculty. The Gallery is also a site of knowledge production dedicated to enhancing the intellectual life on campus by advancing discourses on contemporary exhibition and curatorial practice with its ambitious program of lectures, performances, screenings, discussions, and exhibitions. It is always testing art’s capacity to teach and engage the community. The Gallery is named after one of the School’s most renowned faculty members, Jacob Lawrence, who taught here from 1970–1985 and who served as Professor Emeritus until his death in 2000. The Gallery is the living legacy of Lawrence’s exemplary life and admirable practice. Visit website.

About the School of Art + Art History + Design
The School of Art + Art History + Design is the center for creative innovation and study at the University of Washington, one of the world’s leading public research institutions. The School’s focus on interdisciplinary collaboration and the development of new practices enhances both studio and classroom learning as well as fostering dynamic engagement and critical discourse. Our students are inspired to learn through a rigorous and creative academic experience, competitive internships, and international opportunities. Learning from influential faculty, alumni, visiting artists, designers, and scholars, students of our undergraduate, masters, and doctoral programs investigate and create in an environment of possibility. Visit website.