HCAR Works In Progress Seminar: Jessica Mehta
February 13, 2:30 pm-4:00 pm
Free
Project: “500 Years AGO”
Presenters: Jessica Mehta (The University of Tulsa)
Join us for a roundtable conversation about Jessica Mehta’s visual series “500 Years AGO” a work-in-progress performance and poetic installation that confronts the ongoing afterlives of colonization through the intertwined violences of assimilation, extraction and erasure.
Combining embodied performance, painted text and spoken poetry, the piece situates Indigenous bodies and land as living archives, tracing how histories of gold, oil and cultural theft continue to shape the present moment. Written prior to the most recent election cycle, the accompanying manifesto now functions as an ephemeral document—one that shifts in meaning as political realities sharpen, repeat and rupture.
This talk reflects on the work’s evolving form, its reliance on the body as site and witness, and the ways art can move audiences from passive recognition toward active participation in decolonial futures.
Event registration details are forthcoming. You will receive a digital copy of the paper after registering.
Special Note: There are road closures currently affecting access to the Helmerich Center for American Research. If you are driving to the seminar, please plan to use the designated detour route. You can reach HCAR by taking Newton via Union Street.
Questions about the event can be sent to trm1828@utulsa.edu.