The new “Shore⏐Lines” exhibit, created by Regina Agu, a Chicago-based visual artist, writer and researcher, opened this week at the Museum of Contemporary Photography.
The large panoramic installation traces sites and legacies of historical Black North American migration.
This is the third in her nation-wide series focused on connecting the sociocultural geographies of Black heritage in North America through waterways and natural environments. Her first two were focused in Atlanta and Texas.
Agu was born in Houston, Texas, but has moved to many places both in and out of the U.S. throughout her life. Most recently, she has visited several culturally significant sites while conducting her nine-year photographic investigation about the ties between Black North American migration and water.
She relocated to Chicago in 2020 to study the area’s cultural history in order to “create something that really spoke to the specifics of what those politics looked like here.”
Asha Iman Veal, the associate curator for MoCP, said the museum was uniquely positioned to collaborate with Agu as “everything lined up” to submit a joint proposal for the 2023 Joyce Awards.
The Joyce Foundation seeks to foster collaboration between artists of color and arts organizations near the Great Lakes region by awarding a few applicants $75,000 grants. Their partnership was one of five winners that year.
“We knew that no matter what happened, we would do the show,” Veal said, “but it worked out that it was sponsored by our incredible partners.”
With the additional money, MoCP commissioned another art piece from Agu made specifically for the exhibit. The resulting piece is a 94-foot-long composite panoramic photo titled “Edge, Bank, Shore (2024)” that wraps around the entire four walls of MoCP’s main gallery.
This is the first large-scale panoramic work she has completed outside of Gulf City, Fla., and according to Agu, it was a collaborative effort.
“Community conversations are a big part of whatever I do, but this work is so dependent on people,” Agu said. “It was like a chain reaction.”
The museum held an opening reception on Thursday, Jan. 30. For many, this was one of their favorite displays in the show.
Susan Friel, who works for the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events, has visited the MoCP before. This time, she brought some of her colleagues along to see the new exhibition. She appreciated how the material was purposefully undulating off of the wall, and said that it reminds her of water movements in nature.
Andres Hernandez attended to help support a fellow artist and was interested in the purpose behind Agu’s artistic decisions. “I learned how they use the folds to not flatten the image,” he said. “I love seeing the panoramas billow; it reminds me of ripples.”
Andrea Coleman, an interdisciplinary artist based in Chicago, is a close friend of Agu’s and was in awe of the scale of this piece. “This is huge printing, and I love it,” Coleman said. “It really gives this sense of immersion within the shores.”
Sabrina Miller, the senior communications officer for the Joyce Foundation, said that she loved the banner piece as well.
”I can not think of a more perfect way to open this,” Miller said, “it just envelops you; it just puts you in that place.”
Miller viewed the concept art for much of Agu’s work years ago, and was excited to see it all formally come together.
“I’m really impressed and incredibly proud of her,” she said. “I think one of the best things that artists do is make us think about things we’ve never thought about before and allow us to see things that we’ve never seen before, and I really think that’s what she is doing with this project.”
Many attendees agreed as they recalled learning and understanding new things about the city they call home, including Miller.
“I’ve lived my whole life not even a mile from Rainbow Beach and never knew about the wade-in,” she said.
Similarly, Hernandez, who is also a Chicago native, said that for the first time he considered how other people view the city and its history.
“I’m interested in how I might experience a waterfront that I’ve grown up with in a much different way,” he said.
Sarah Podge, a graduate student at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, appreciated that the exhibit took on multiple perspectives.
“I really like the historical component of combining Chicago and the south as well, then seeing those contrasts and similarities,” she said.
Maddie Easton, the assistant for Joyce Foundation’s culture program, said she was delighted to see the fruition of Agu’s work and its impact.
“This is a big discussion across a lot of foundations right now, the intersection of all these forms,” Easton said. “I think there’s something really beautiful about the work and how it speaks to social change.”
Veal said that this was one of the reasons she was drawn to curate these pieces in the first place.
“Having the opportunity to tap into that history in a way that is so new and contemporary,” Veal said. “It really animates that history in a way that is so accessible for people, and I hope is exciting.”
While opening up “a space for memory and contemplation” was always Agu’s goal in this exhibit, she also hopes to spark a larger conversation about how to use photography as an expansive medium within Columbia’s student body.
Agu believes that “a landscape is a constructed idea,” but said students should remember to be “thinking about what we also bring to the work that we’re doing.”
Regina Agu’s “Shore⏐Lines” exhibit will remain on display until May 17, 2025 at the Museum of Contemporary Photography.
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