2020 has been a wild ride and I am grateful for the amount of support I've gotten as this pandemic has raged on. I'm beyond blessed to announce that I am one of three recipients of the ICA/Boston's 2021 Foster Prize along with Marlon Forrester and Eben Haines. The exhibition opens on August 25, 2021 so stay tuned for more details. Here's a link to the Boston Globe article: www.bostonglobe.com/2021/02/26/lifestyl…

Here's a link to my latest newsletter which has updates on the other projects I've been working on: mailchi.mp/2dbbb6d7d49c/dells-studio-up…

In the midst of the protests and uprisings in support of #BreonnaTaylor, #George Floyd and #AhmaudArbery, I was featured in an article by Cate McQuaid in the Boston Globe along with fellow artists Marlon Forrester and Anthony Young regarding how our artistic practice tackles racism, social justice and history. You can check out the article via the link. Big thanks to Cate and Mariano Garcia Cortes Cadavid for his photo of my performance of Blues\Blank\Black in the 13th Havana Biennial for the Rios Intermittentes exhibition curated by Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons in 2019.
www.bostonglobe.com/2020/06/04/arts/3-b…

I'm thrilled to share a review by artist Silvi Naçi of my 2019 solo show, which appeared in NKA Journal of Contemporary African Art (November 2019, #45) as well as an essay about my performance of "Blues\Blank\Black" by scholar Liliana Gómez-Popescu (Universität Zürich) in Ibéroamericana America Latina - España - Portugal (Vol 19, #72). You can read the articles in this Mailchimp link eepurl.com/gJ4zZ1

I've just returned from Matanzas, Cuba where my work is in the group show "Intermittent Rivers" as part of the 13th Havana Biennale in Cuba. This beautiful show has been mounted in the Palacio de Justicia and was curated by Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons, Octavio Zaya, Selene Wendt and Salah Hassan. It's an achievement and honor to be in the company of major Cuban artists such as Lorenzo Padilla as well as American artists Carrie Mae Weems, Julie Mehretu, Dawit Petros, Cosmo Whyte, Melvin Edwards, Tracy Snelling among others. You can check out images of my site-specific series "Dentro de Matanzas in Two Suitcases" on my instagram feed via @dellmhamilton. You can also learn more about Magda's vision for the project here: bit.ly/2Pn2Rm5

The praise and accolades for my curatorial project "Nine Moments for Now" with a nomination for a Hubweek Art Award in the Curatorial Gems category. Huge congratulations goes to artist, poet and all around genius Joy Buolamwini for her contribution to the exhibition with her work "AI, Ain't I A Woman" which highlights the inherent biases built into facial recognition technology. You can learn more about the awards and the other nominees by visiting adobe.ly/2u2is0B

It was such a treat to talk to Sandi Klein for her podcast series on creative women. In this interview I discuss how my practice has evolved over the years and how I have transformed my life by channeling my creativity into everything I do. You can check out the interview at www.sandikleinshow.com

I was also recently selected to be part of a limited edition "Women in Community Arts" trading card series. The series was designed by Neil Horsky & published by BRAIN Arts Organization and the Boston Hassle. I feel immensely blessed to be part of a lineup that includes the legendary Elma Lewis as well as L'Merchie Frazier, Dey Hernández, Veronica Robles and many others. Read more about this beautiful tribute here: bit.ly/2UpmuLY

Happy 2019, I am excited to announce that my first solo show "All Languages Welcomed HERE" opens on January 10-February 8 2019. It's an intimate and concise show and there will be an opening reception on January 16 at 6pm and a performance of "This Is All We Have" on January 23 at 6pm. Exhibition link with more info about the show is here: bit.ly/2rR2KnO

It's been an absolute labor of love to be the guest curator for Harvard's Cooper Gallery of African and African American Art. This project has enabled me to work with artists whose work I have been following for years including Carrie Mae Weems, Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons, Steve Locke, Tomashi Jackson and so many more. You can read more about why "Nine Moments for Now" was ranked as one of 2018's best exhibitions by Hyperallergic.com by visiting the Cooper Gallery's website at coopergalleryhc.org. "Nine Moments for Now" was also a important opportunity to partner with For Freedoms, a platform that highlights the relationship between art and civic discourse. For Freedoms was founded by fellow artists Hank Willis Thomas and Eric Gottesman, and you can learn more about For their efforts and their 50 States Initiative at forfreedoms.org.

Some wonderful news to share. I am excited to have been selected to be a part of the Now + There 2019 Public Art Accelerator Cohort. A huge thank you to Kate Gilbert & Leah Triplett Harrington and the jurors. A big congrats to my fellow cohort members: Pat Falco, Cat Mazza, Samantha Fields, David Buckley Borden, and Daniela Rivera. bit.ly/2FwZJ5K.

I will be co-lecturing with fellow artist Allison Maria Rodriguez at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts/Tufts University on November 20 from 2:30pm-4:30pm. We will be discussing the relationship between art and trauma and how artists channel and learn from their experiences.

As part of #Hubweek programming, on Saturday, October 13 at 11am fellow artist Steve Locke and I will be on a panel called "The Publics of Art" discussing the impact of public art and its role within culture and society. Many of the events are free, you just have to register via the Hubweek website. Also a huge thank you to Steve and Leonie Bradbury for reaching out to me. 2018.hubweek.org/agenda/session/30873

In the spirit of art and its ability to examine society, history and civic discourse, I am excited to be the guest curator of “Nine Moments for Now” an exhibition that opens in October at Harvard’s Cooper Gallery of African and African American Art. In conjunction with For Freedoms's 50 State initiative, the show features the work of Steve Locke, Corita Kent, Shepherd Fairey, Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons and Carrie Mae Weems. More details and programming are in the works: www.coopergalleryhc.org.

I am honored to be one of the subjects in Leyla Tonak's documentary film "Bodies of Work: Artists on Representation and Responsibility" along with Nona Faustine, Maria Molteni, Ariel Freiberg, and Lara Ayad. It was a thrill to engage with Leyla and her team on such urgent cultural questions on artists and their roles in art and culture. You can view the film here: bit.ly/2tzx07K.

I will be having my first solo show at the Winfisky Gallery at Salem State University in Massachusetts in 2019. The show is titled "All Languages Welcomed Here" and will open on January 10. Stay tuned for more details, meanwhile you can learn more about Salem State University at www.salemstate.edu.

I'm excited to be heading to Oklahoma for the first to perform at the Living Arts Center in Tulsa. I will be performing Blues\Blank\Black on Sunday, June 17 as part of their Juneteenth programming. I will post more details soon, in the meantime, between time, you can learn more about the LAC, here: www.livingarts.org.

I will be performing a new work entitled "This Is All We Have" for a collaborative night of art entitled "Interstellar Sanctuary" in conjunction with the Run of the Mills Series. "Interstellar Sanctuary" takes place on April 21, 2018 and is curated by Anna Wexler and Jesseca Ferguson and includes the work of James Ellis Coleman, Elisa Hamilton, Mark Pevsner, among others. My performance of "This Is All We Have" will take place at 6:30PM in the Mills Gallery on the BCA campus. This performance investigates the implications of the “plantationocene” which in contrast to the anthropocene, takes seriously the long-term impact of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, racial capitalism and the relationship between plantation economies and violence. You can learn more about "Interstellar Sanctuary" by visiting www.bcaonline.org. Hope to see you there!

Happy Spring - Happy March, it's been a hectic month. I recently presented a lecture at Lesley University for their art and social justice series where I discussed the evolution of my work as an artist, curator, writer and how I moved between all those worlds. Later this month I am moderating a panel at the next Black Portraitures IV: The Color of Silence conference happening on March 22-24 at Harvard. The panel is entitled "Between Land, Water and Language: The Black Atlantic in Conversation with the Western Caribbean." You can learn more about the conference here www.blackportraitures.info. I am also curating an exhibition of all black women artists based in the Boston area entitled "#SayHerName: Watch Us WERK" at Lesley University. Opening reception is March 29 from 6pm-8pm. You can learn more about the exhibition here lesley.edu/events/sayhername-watch-us-w….

Fall 2017 is here! Save the date for September 20, when I will be participating in a panel discussion with fellow artists Anique Jones and Amanda Russell Wallace at MIT - entitled "Black. Body. Art: Feminist Articulations of Race, Gender and Geography." It will take place from 5:30-7:30 pm in Tang Hall aka Building E51, Room 095. The discussion will be moderated by Professor Kimberly Juanita Brown and each of us will be discussing how our artistic practices are informed by feminist theory and body art.

On Thursday, May 18, I will be in conversation with fellow artist James Montford, Jr. discussing the powerful work created by distinguished RISD alumni, the artist Kara Walker. The event is sponsored by Stages of Freedom and take places at 5:30pm at the RISD Art Museum. For more details, visit: www.stagesoffreedom.org/speaking See you there!

Check out my latest post on for Big, Red & Shiny: "Adventures in the Archive: Zora Neale Hurston and 'The Lost City'": tinyurl.com/kykhh6u. Upcoming performances: I will be performing on Friday, May 5 along with Bryana Siobhan and Tsedaye Makonnen at the Fifth Exposure Symposium at Mount Holyoke College - organized by Professor Kimberly Juanita Brown, founder of The Dark Room: Race and Visual Culture Faculty Seminar, More details to come soon!

I am about midway through my online residency for Big, Red & Shiny. I will be writing two more posts for the residency and I would like to thank to Scout Hutchinson & Leah Triplett Harrington for this opportunity to write about my process, projects, and influences. To check out my last three posts, visit: bigredandshiny.org/author/dell-m-hamilt…

Save the date for March 16, 2017 when I will perform Blues\Blank\Black as part of the Occupancies exhibition taking place at Boston University. You can find more details about the performance here: www.bu.edu/art/2017/02/07/performance-d…

Many thanks to Lynne Cooney and Kimber Chewning for including my video "Desire & Duchamp" in the Occupancies show at BU. What a gift to be showing amongst such stellar artists: Allegra, eBAY, Andrea Bowers, Jonathan Calm, Jordan Casteel, Edie Fake, Nona Faustine, Marlon Forrester, Chitra Ganesh, Jonah Groeneboer, Ramiro Gomez, Ann Hirsch, Intelligent Mischief (Aisha Shillingford and Terry Marshall), Ellen Lesperance, Tony Lewis, Museum of Transgender Hirstory and Art courtesy of the artist Chris E. Vargas, L.J. Roberts, Kameelah Janan Rasheed, Shen Wei, and Nabeela Vega. For more details on the exhibition: www.bu.edu/art/2017/01/13/occupancies/

I am currently ensconced in Samsøñ' s invite-only artist residency program. Samsøñ' is a Boston-based internationally positioned gallery space headed up by Camilo Alvarez with support from his assistant directors Silvi Naci and Sam Toable. I am the (SubSamsøñ) artist through the end of August so stop by for a studio visit at any of their next three First Friday events (6pm-8pm) on June 3, July 1 or August 5. Shout out to Samsøñ interns Liz and Audrey for all their help over the past few months as well!

#BlackGirlLit: Between Literature, Performance & Memory will be an evening of performance art that brings together my work alongside the work of fellow contemporary artists: Ayana Evans (New York), Tsedaye Makonnen (Washington, D.C.), Marcelline Mandeng (Philadelphia), Helina Metaferia (San Francisco), and Bryana Siobhan & Kal Gezahegn (Boston).
Riffing off the hashtag anthem #BlackGirlMagic coined by fashion designer & blogger Auntie Peebz and the double meaning of the term “lit” - (‘to turn up' or short-hand for ‘literature’), I organized this #BlackGirlLit performance art program to feature work that pivots off of the written and oral traditions of both American and transnationalist black feminist/womanist frameworks. To learn more about the event and the participating artists, visit: bit.ly/1Z90793.

Really excited to be performing with fellow artists Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons and Neil Leonard Saturday, 5/14 at 4pm, as part of the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery's series "Identify: Performance Art as Portraiture" curated by Dorothy Moss. To learn more about the project, visit: npg.si.edu/exhibit/identify/campospons.…

Fellow artist and blogger Nick Ward recently wrote about my photo series "Emulsions in Departure" when he came to visit my studio at Samson Projects - I am really thrilled that the work is making an impact and that people are engaged in my process, check out the post here: nickwardonline.com/dell-hamilton-at-sub…

I am really excited to announce that I am the 11th SubSamsøñ artist and will be in residence there from March through August 2016. I am looking forward to developing new studio projects and working with Camilo, Sam, Silvi, Audrey and Liz. To learn more about more Samsøñ and its artist residency program, visit www.samsonprojects.com.

Happy New Year!

I am excited to be starting the new year off with the beauty of possibilities and new directions in my art practice.

On Thursday, January 19 at 6 pm, I will be performing with my mentor Magda Campos-Pons at the opening reception for her new collaborative multimedia exhibition with Neil Leonard, "Alchemy of the Soul" at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem. To learn more about that exhibition, visit: pem.org/exhibitions/188-alchemy_of_the_…

On March 3, I will be a visiting artist to the Studio for Inter-Related Media at Mass Art where I will present a talk on recent work including my P.L.A.Y. (Poetry, Light, Art, You) project and then on May 21, I will be presenting a new performance piece, inspired by the pioneering anthropologist and writer Zora Neale Hurston, at Five Myles in Brooklyn. Follow me on Twitter @dellmhamilton for more details in the months to come!

Last week, I performed in a play called "Hung Out to Dry" at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston. I played Boston politician Louise Day Hicks along with an brilliant ensemble cast and crew. The play was written and directed by by Danielle Abrams and juxtaposed the history of racial integration at the legendary Black Mountain College with the history of busing and desegregation in Boston. Photos and documentation of the play to be posted soon!

I will be presenting work at Panoply Performance Lab in Brooklyn on December 17 for one night of performances with fellow artists Helina Metafaria, Ayanna Evans, & Tsedaye Makonnen. To find out more about the event, check out the FB event here: www.facebook.com/events/850264168404651/

In the spirit of experimental and ephemeral art pioneered by individual artists such as John Cage, Yoko Ono, and Allen Kaprow, in the performance art world, an “event score” is simply a set of instructions that are:

• Created to instigate participatory actions that are executed and interpreted by multiple individuals
• Enacted over time, geography and context
• Performed with a great deal of reverence for play, possibility serendipity and the live moment

As such, P.L.A.Y. (Poetry, Light, Art, You) is conceived as a participatory, virtual, poetic event score. P.L.A.Y. invites individuals from all walks of life to broadcast a poem about light via the new live feed mobile app Periscope. You are free to perform texts by published poets, to improvise on the spot, or read a poem created from your own imagination.

The poem can simply include the word “light” in it or “light” can be interpreted e.g. weight, mood, scientific, environmental, spiritual or visual. Poems can take any form such as sonnets, haikus, raps, limericks, or riddles. As an example, check out my reading of David Baker's poem "Pastoral" on Vimeo here: bit.ly/1jbaKJK.

Want to participate in P.L.A.Y. right now? Get started by sending me an email at dell@dellmhamilton.com or visit www.illuminusboston.org/project/play

Also contact me if you would like to present a "poetic scope" about light during the Illuminus Festival on Saturday, October 10. Many thanks for participating!

Last month I submitted to Creative Time's Summit Open Call which took place at the 2015 Venice Biennale. While the submission was not accepted (their loss): I am pasting below the text of my submission and will be continuing to develop a new body of work that builds upon the insights of my own performance art practice and the work of other conceptual artists such as Francis Alys, Helen Mirra, William PopeL., Marina Abramovic and Bruce Nauman.

"In November I executed a project called “Where Else Williamsburg?”, an almost 13-hour walking expedition, to discern the social and economic gentrifications that have impacted Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The haptic conditions of contemporary culture urges humans to be tethered to multiple screens because our gadgets promise that the world can be knowable, measured, critiqued, and democratic. Instead this project asserts that 'walking as research' facilitated through the body’s sensing of time, scale, and distance through ambulatory action serves as counterpoint to the “intelligence” of our smart devices. Such learning offers access to inter-subjective contexts while providing the possibility of how lived 'who-ness' operates in geographic 'where-ness'. To check out images of this work, go to: dellmhamilton.com/artwork/3753539.html

I will be doing a performance entitled "After & Then" at Montserrat College of Art on October 14. The piece is slowly taking shape but more details to come very soon!

I will be doing an informal discussion of my recent photographic projects at the Photographic Resource Center's ongoing series 'Nights at the PRC' on December 9 at 6:30 p.m. The theme will be the intersection between performance, photography and persona. I am excited about sharing this new body of work. Here is the FB link with more info www.facebook.com/events/166898535334434…

I will be presenting an artist talk at a major conference to be held on the Florence, Italy campus of NYU. The conference will take place May 27-May 31. Organized by artist and historian Deborah Willis, the conference is entitled "Black Portraiture{s} II: Imaging the Black Body and Re-staging Histories." My presentation is part of a panel, "Blackness in the Public Sphere," designed by Professor Kimberly Juanita Brown, founder of The Dark Room: Race and Visual Culture Seminar. To learn more about 'Black Portraitures II', visit drive.google.com/file/d/0B3aSoKP99QEtcz…

I will be delivering an artist talk at Monserrat College of Art in Beverly, Massachusetts on April 30. For more details, please visit www.montserrat.edu/galleries/public-pro…

I am very excited to be performing in Williamsburg, Brooklyn on November 7 as part of a series being curated by Petrichor Performance Collective and Panoply Performance Lab! I will be doing a durational performance to explore the themes of renovation, re-invention, roaming and ritual by visiting pre-planned and spontaneous sites of interest in Williamsburg. I'll be posting more details about my performance here as I further develop the project. More details about this series in general can be found via this Facebook invite. tinyurl.com/lvn2f5p

This fall, I will be participating in an artist exchange and performing at Panoply Performance Laboratory in Brooklyn. The dates are November 7 & 8. I'm very excited to be a part of the group show - stay tuned for more details!

Very excited to have my work along with that of artists Christine A. Banna, Faith Johnson, Cameron Patrick Quinlan, and Alana Tashjian in an exhibition at the MALE Center sponsored by the Boston LGBTQIA Artist Aliance to bring awareness about the continuing fight against HIV/AIDS. Call 617-450-1987 for gallery hours. Vivere November 8 - December 27, 2013 Male Center 571 Columbus Ave Boston, MA. Please visit: blaa.us/?tribe_events=vivere#! for more info.

A big thank-you to Leah Craig at The Howard Project for asking me to participate in their recent Performing Praxis artist lecture series. My talk was entitled "The Archive is Present: Practice, Process, and the Sticky Image" and addressed the use of historical archives and images and their intersection with my own practice and contemporary art. To learn more about The Howard Art Project, please visit howardartproject.wordpress.com/2013/09/…

Earlier this year, I played the character of Flory Jackson in a film, entitled Flower Child, by Angela Counts, a brilliant playwright and film-maker based in Boston. The film is an familial odyssey that weaves between the 1960's and the present and it was a joy to experiment with the acting process again and resurrect the complicated role of high-powered L.A. attorney Flory Jackson. The film will be screening in the Alfond Room, at the Museum of Fine Arts on December 5 and 9. Stay tuned for more details!

My interview with David Adjaye, lead architect of the new Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, has appeared in Transition 110. Published by Indiana University Press, if you have an academic affiliation, Transition can be accessed via Jstor at www.jstor.org/action/showPublication?jo…. To learn more about Transition magazine, please visit dubois.fas.harvard.edu/transition-magaz…

This past February and March, I presented a section from my forthcoming paper "Disjunctive Blackness, Racialized Vistas and the Paris Exposition Universelle of 1900" at Boston University and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts. Big shout-out to Jeannie Simms, Bonnie Donahue, John Thornton, Linda Heywood and their students for their continued support and interest in what I hope will be a critical contribution to the discourse of exposition/worlds fairs studies.

Later this month in February, I will be discussing both my studio and research interests at the School of Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. I am vey much looking forward to seeing the students and faculty there again. Stay tuned for more details.

I have just returned from Paris where I presented my recent research on the Paris Exposition Universelle of 1900 at the Musee Quai Branly during the Black Portraitures: The Black Body in the West conference organized by Deborah Willis, Cheryl Finley and Henry Louis Gates. The turn-out (500+ attendees) was overwhelming with artists, curators, scholars and the general public coming from across the globe. To check out pics and learn about updates related to the conference, go to www.facebook.com/BlackPortraitures?ref=… or terrencejennings.photoshelter.com/galle…

I am showing my latest work at Spoke Gallery/Medicine Wheel Productions in South Boston in a show entitled "Here" along with artists Ahmed Abdalla • Genara Banzon
L'Merchie Frazier • Josephine Pergola • Dan McCole • Courtney Moy and Mario Quiroz. The show will be up until March 16. Special thanks to Kathleen Bittetti and Michael Dowling for their support. For info and directions, go to www.mwponline.org/

I will be showing my Banana Republic: Conflations and Migrations installation piece at the Joan Resnikoff Gallery at Roxbury Community College. The show is organized by Violence Transformed and the opening reception will be on April 5. More details about the show can be found by visiting www.violencetransformed.com/calendar/

Here's some video, where I discuss my most recent work, Desire & Duchamp. The piece debuted at the Fort Point Artist Building in South Boston Enjoy! www.youtube.com/watch?v=13AvddEdqZc&…

Thanks to everyone for attending the opening reception for Here We Are, Who Cares? Part II on July 21. The turnout was great and I am very much looking forward to talking about my video piece, Desire & Duchamp at the artist talk on August 11, 7 p.m. You can see the work at the Fort Point Artist Building, 300 Summer Street, South Boston, (Red Line South Station T stop). For more details on the show and the artist talk, please visit, www.fortpointarts.org.

Thanks to all my friends, classmates, and family that came out for the First Fridays April 1 opening reception of Here We Are, Who Cares? at NK Gallery in Boston's SoWa district. It was a packed house and I am still going through the documentation to figure out what photos and video to add, so stay tuned.

In the meantime, I wanted to post the wall description and web links that were developed for the art installation.

“Banana Republic: Conflations and Migrations” investigates the impact of American political economy on Honduran history and contemporary culture. In her book Working Hard, Drinking Hard: On Violence and Survival in Honduras, (University of California Press, 2008) anthropologist Adrienne Pine describes Honduras as the intersection between labor, violence, U.S. imperialism, and bodily self-worth. Many thanks to historians John K. Thornton and Linda M. Heywood, authors of Central Africans, Atlantic Creoles, and the Foundation of the Americas, 1585-1660, (Cambridge University Press, 2007) for their assistance in the development of this project and for their help on a forthcoming Facebook page.

Recommended reading:
Glenn Chambers, Race, Nation, and West Indian Immigration to Honduras, 1890-1940, Louisiana State University Press, 2010.

Western Caribbean Zone
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Caribbean…

Tela, Honduras
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tela

Puerto Cortes, Honduras
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puerto_Cort&eacut…

United Fruit Historical Society
www.unitedfruit.org

Using my own family as a case study, I am currently working on a project with historian John K. Thornton on the African diasporic roots of Honduras and its connections to American history and culture.

Opening Reception
April 1, 2011
NK Gallery, 460A Harrison Avenue, Boston, MA

My thesis show is almost here! Join me, Daisy Patton, Heather LaForce, Ingrid Sanchez, and Sofia Botero for the opening reception of HERE WE ARE, WHO CARES at the NK Gallery in Boston's SoWa art district. More details to come www.nkgboston.com/index.html

2010 Perfolink: Maestros y Discipulos, Concepcion, Chile
2010 Roxbury Open Studios, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
2010 Harvard Black Arts Festival, Holyoke Center, Cambridge
2010 CUSP presented by Samson Projects and Mobius, Boston
2010 Art Rages/Surreal Estate presented by Mobius, Boston
2009 The Mind is a Beautiful Beast, OKW Gallery, Boston
2008 Many Hands, Cambridge Center for Adult Education, Cambridge

Bio/CV available upon request

The Image of the Black in Western Art Symposium was a big success, we had a great turnout of artists, curators, and art historians. I feel really privileged to be a member of the Du Bois Institute's intellectual community and to be a part of the team that is helping to get the word out about this seminal art historical series. Check out the media coverage at news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2010/11/….