Expanded Perspectives: Architects of Liberation Study Day brings together leading scholars, designers, and artists on the occasion of the exhibition Architects of Liberation: Modernism in Western Africa.
Antawan I. Byrd will deliver a keynote lecture drawing on his dynamic approach to assessing Pan-African history, delicately weaving threads through cultural practices, painful and enduring legacies, and co-emergent sociopolitical contexts. François-Xavier Gbré, Olalekan Jeyifous, and Marilyn Nance will present short anecdotal presentations on their work and their personal connections to the exhibition, followed by a moderated discussion with the exhibition’s curator, Martino Stierli.
Antawan I. Byrd is an assistant professor of art history at Northwestern University and an associate curator of photography and media at the Art Institute of Chicago. His research and teaching focus on the art and culture of Africa and the African diaspora from the late-19th century to the present. He recently co-curated Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica (2024–2026), a major survey exhibition examining Pan-Africanism’s influence on culture throughout the long 20th century. The exhibition opened at the Art Institute of Chicago in December 2024, traveled to Barcelona’s Museum of Contemporary Art in November 2025, and opened at London’s Barbican Art Centre in June 2026.
Born in 1978 in Lille, France, François-Xavier Gbré lives and works between La Rochelle, France, and Abidjan, Ivory Coast. In touch with time and geography, his work summons the language of architecture as a witness to memory and social change. From colonial remains to landscapes redefined by current events, he explores territories and revisits history. This constant dialogue with his environment leads him to use different scales and modes of exhibition, whether in the presentation of meticulous installations, linked to a real investigation of the territory, or in the use of architecture itself to make photography resonate in a physical relationship with the spectator or the public space.
Olalekan Jeyifous received a bachelor of architecture from Cornell University and is a Brooklyn-based artist whose work reimagines the intersections of architecture, community, and the environment through inventive visual storytelling. By merging physical and digital elements with both historical and speculative contexts, his practice offers critical reflections on existing systems while imagining alternative ways of relating to each other and the spaces we inhabit. His art has been exhibited at such major institutions as the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Vitra Design Museum, and Guggenheim Bilbao, and is held in the permanent collections of The Museum of Modern Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, and SFMOMA.
Marilyn Nance started making photographs of daily life in New York City at the age of 18, and at 23, she joined the FESTAC 77 United States delegation as technical support for the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture in Lagos, Nigeria, where she created one of the most vibrant, visual records of the Pan-African gathering. Nance continued making images with equal attention to historical events, family moments, community gatherings, trips abroad, and quiet moments.
Accessibility
This theater is equipped with an induction loop that transmits directly to hearing aids with T-coils.
American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation is available for public programs upon request with two weeks’ advance notice. MoMA will make every effort to provide accommodation for requests made with less than two weeks’ notice. Please contact [email protected] to make a request for these accommodations.
The nearest all-gender restroom is located in the Cullman Mezzanine.
Wheelchair-accessible seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis.
For more information on accessibility at MoMA, please visit moma.org/visit/accessibility.
Major funding is provided by the Agnes Gund Education Endowment Fund for Public Programs, the Jeanne Thayer Young Scholars Fund, and the Annual Education Fund.