Oppositional Gaze: Black Feminist Photography as Feminist Resistance

bell hooks, celebrated author, theorist, educator, and social critic, used the term ‘oppositional gaze’ to describe the resistant strategies Black Women and Queer imagemakers employ to challenge the colonial and patriarchal gaze. In their lecture ‘Oppositional Gaze: Black Feminist Photography as Feminist Resistance’, Janine Francois will use this term to analyse how photography has been used to both reinforce stereotypes and to reclaim self-identification through the work of Black female artists.

Janine will help understand how the colonial use of photography reinforced damaging stereotypes about Black people’s sexuality to justify their racial and gendered hierarchies. She’ll then delve into the practices of Sonia Boyce, Zanele Muholi, Favour Johnathan and Khadija Saye who all use photography to frame the Black female and or queer subject through self-representation, storytelling, humour, and critique; with each artist challenging the supposed ‘neutral-white-male-human-subject by centring Black Women and Queer identities.

We are committed to making our sessions as accessible as possible. If you are unable to pay the full amount for this class, please reach out to us via email at [email protected] and we will provide you with a discount code.