Photo Credit: ARTECHOUSE
Juneteenth, the day marking the official freeing of African American slaves at the end of the Civil War, is this Sunday, June 19. It’s been celebrated for over 150 years but last year Congress passed a bill to finally make Juneteenth a federal holiday. With a prime location such as Washington, DC there are so many educational, eye-opening ways to honor Juneteenth and its culture. We’ve rounded up five meaningful ways to observe and learn about the holiday in DC.
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1238 Maryland Ave. SW / Website
Check out ARTECHOUSE’s latest, multi-sensory, immersive art exhibit, entitled Ase: Afro Frequencies. The exhibit explores the Black experience through the eyes of Afro-surrealist artist Vince Fraser and American poet Ursula Rucker. Utilizing the gallery’s multimedia setup, the exhibit fills the space, using 270-degree floor-to-wall projections and a spatialized audio system.
ARTECHOUSE launched the “We Rise Above” collaboration with Fraser in August 2020 following the Black Lives Matter protests, according to their press release. This exhibit is another installation from the collaboration and combines symbolism with interactive images to depict critical moments in Black history. Read more about the exhibit and purchase tickets here.
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2700 F St. NW / Website
Head to the Kennedy Center’s opera house to experience a beautiful performance of Reframing the Narrative, by the Dance Theatre of Harlem, Ballethnic Dance Company, and Collage Dance Collective. Black ballet dancers have long been forgotten and this performance explores how they are crucial to the history (and advancement) of ballet. Curated by Theresa Ruth Howard, the founder of Memoirs of Blacks in Ballet, and Denise Saunders Thompson, the president and CEO of The International Association of Blacks In Dance, this show guarantees to be historical, graceful, emotional, memorable, and one not to miss.
The program runs until Sunday, June 19. Tickets start at $29 and can be purchased here.
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6th St. & Constitution Ave. NW / Website
On view until July 17, explore this in-depth look at the cultural and historical legacy of Black and African people since the 1600s, entitled Afro-Atlantic Histories. The exhibit focuses on art depicting the Black experience after the African Diaspora, which refers to the forced mass scattering of African residents during the Transatlantic Slave Trades mainly in the 1500s and 1600s.
Afro-Atlantic Histories features over 130 works of art, including sculptures, paintings, photographs, and time-based media by artists from Africa, the Caribbean, Europe, and the Americas. The exhibit is on view in the West Building on the main floor in galleries 72 to 79.
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1400 Constitution Ave. NW / Website
Honor Juneteenth while learning all there is to know about the tradition at the National Museum of African American History & Culture. The museum will host an all-day, family-friendly Juneteenth celebration on Monday, June 20.
At 11 a.m., the museum will host New York Times bestselling author Rio Cortez for a reading of her popular rhyming kid’s book The ABCs of Black History. Throughout the day there will be live “living history” performances depicting how the United States Colored Troops were assembled, what the Emancipation Proclamation actually did, and why Juneteenth is significant to this day. The museum recommends these educational performances for those 8 years old and above. At 3 p.m., the museum will host twice Grammy-nominated trumpeter Alphonso Horne and the Gotham Kings for an afternoon of fabulous jazz music. This performance will also be streamed online.
Advanced registration is required for each event and can be done here.
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Online Exhibition / Website
Stay in the comfort of your home and view the National Museum of the American Indian’s first exhibition to feature solely Black-Indigenous women artists, entitled Ancestors Know Who We Are. The online exhibit includes six women artists and the paintings, photographs, baskets, and digital art that express their views and tells their stories. Along with high-quality immersive art photography, the exhibit includes artist interviews and essays from scholars exploring how being mixed-race and having a female gender identity influence the artwork. Check out the online exhibition here.
Photography by: ARTECHOUSE
