Majesty Royale-Jackson’s riot space

riot space is a performance-installation centering and speculating on Black queer history in image, digital media, and sound. The installation, a collection of animated GIF images created from archival footage sourced from in and around Durham, projected through and onto various materials, will occupy Durham County Main Library from October 9 – November 9, 2023. Alongside the installation, the artist will conduct three live movement and sound-based performances in relationship to the themes that inspire the installation: slippage, place/placeless-ness, defiance, and an otherwise existence. riot space is seeking something that moves, evidence of a more riotous way of being. A frame for the uncapturable: a queerness.

Queerness as not only about sexuality or gender, “but ‘queer’ as being about the self that is at odds with everything around it and that has to invent and create and find a place to speak and to thrive and to live” (bell hooks).

Pre-show, 6:45 PM: 15 minutes prior to the official start of each performance at Durham Main Library, Majesty will begin a pre-show journey beginning at CCB Plaza (the corner of Corcoran and Parrish streets, near the bull statue) and arriving at the library’s Outdoor Amphitheatre. The walk should take 15-20 minutes. You can choose to join us on the walk at any point or to meet us at the library where the main performance will take place.