BlackMass on Canal
January 2025 – May 2025
BlackMass on Canal was a research project.
While in residence at Canal Projects, BlackMass Publishing hosted a series of happenings and public programs. The core focus of their residency-as-research project was to take a look at the intersections between architecture, archival practices, film, poetic expression, through publishing as a practice with the aim of fostering public engagement; exploring how these mediums inform and interact with each other in contemporary social culture, spatially and visually. During the residency, the role of publishing as a platform for promoting discourse was explored, specifically thinking about how print and digital media contribute to the preservation and reinterpretation of traditions and how these traditions help shape collective memory.
In addition the research considered the physical and conceptual spaces where poetry and film intersect with architecture in engineered design, temporary installation, performance, etc. and how these spaces contribute to a broader dialogue on the role of culture in society. By focusing on these cross-disciplinary interactions, there was an aim to discover ways of experiencing and understanding art in both public and private spheres, through gathering.
While onsite, BlackMass Publishing curated a public library that continued to expand throughout their residency. Seed collection provided by Kurt Thometz/Jumel Terrace Books.
Public Programs:
a poets cypher with Morian Mikhail and David Williams, Saturday, February 22, 2025 (5–7PM)
Three Star Books × BlackMass Publishing: Book Launch & Performance, Saturday, March 15, 2025 (6–8 PM)
Tesseract Program 2 with Caleb Giles, Warner Meadows, Natalia Catalan, Friday, March 28, 2025 (8–9 PM)
About BlackMass Publishing:
BlackMass Publishing is an independent publisher founded in 2019. At once a structure of coherent units and a collection of disjointed parts, BlackMass invokes an aggregate of Blackness, of matter in resistance. Combining archival photographs and found print material with poetry and jazz music, BlackMass grapples with the blurred lines and idiosyncrasies which make up the collective improvisation of African diasporic culture.
