Paul Maheke’s performances and installations explore the potential of the body as an archive and how history, memory, and identity are formed and constituted through the body. With particular attention to dance, Maheke’s performances reflect on representations of queer Blackness in Western imaginations.
For ICA Performs, Paul Maheke presents The Distance is Nowhere, a performance created in collaboration with artist and filmmaker Sophie Mallett in 2018. Combining sound, text, and movement, The Distance is Nowhere explores transitional spaces, using water as a metaphor for the pathways among the body, information and knowledge, and sociopolitical and historical concerns. Accompanied by Mallett’s score, Maheke’s composition moves across a platform situated in the open space of the sculpture garden, translating sound and text into movement.
Paul Maheke (b. 1985, Brive-la-Gaillarde, France) lives and works in London. They received an MA in art practice from École nationale supérieure d’arts de Paris-Cergy and completed the Associates Programme at Open School East, London. Previous solo exhibitions have been presented at Vleeshal Middelburg, the Netherlands; Chisenhale Gallery, London; Galerie Sultana, Paris; Assembly Point, London; Center, Berlin; and South London Gallery. Select group exhibitions include those at Tate Modern, London; Diaspora Pavilion, 57th Venice Biennale; and Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, among others.
This program is organized by ICA Miami and curated by Stephanie Seidel, Associate Curator.
Funding for Paul Maheke "The Distance is Nowhere" is provided by Jay Franke and David Herro.
Additional support is provided by FUSED (French U.S. Exchange in Dance), a program developed by FACE Foundation and the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States with the support of the Florence Gould Foundation, the Ford Foundation, Institute Français-Paris, the French Ministry of Culture, and private donors.
