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During this conversation PRG’s 5th Artist in Residence, visual artist and DJ Khari Johnson-Ricks will discuss the legacy of house dance with electronic musician and filmmaker MoMa READY.
Throughout the duration of his residency, Khari will use his studio as a living archive to preserve the history of Jersey club and Jersey club dancing; a local vernacular tradition that is 20 years old and has been a creative framework for many young Black musician and artists. Over the years, venues that were the hubs for Jersey club culture in Newark have been shuttered and Khari’s hope is to revitalize and honor this creative subculture by inviting a host of jersey club producers, dancers, and community members to the studio to map the progression of dances over time and talk to people about their experience with the art form. By collecting their stories, he would preserve the trajectory of the subculture and its correlation to Newark’s shifting arts landscape, connecting this local tradition to a lineage of Black radical art movements such as Hip-Hop and House Music. RSVP required. Zoom details will be sent via email confirmation.
Khari Johnson-Ricks is an artist and DJ whose work spans a range of audiovisual media and often exist in the public eye. This includes the production of zines, works on paper, performances, murals, and nightlife spaces. Through these media he explores the ways that vernacular ritual practice becomes tradition and how the body carries history through movement. By editing, rediscovering, juxtaposing the movement traditions of Shotokan Karate, Jersey Club, weightlifting and various other sports he highlights the social importance of movement as a non-verbal communication method as well as a community building and mental health tool. Khari holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Montclair State University (2016) and a Master of Fine Arts from Hunter College, City University of New York (2019).
Wyatt D. Stevens aka MoMa READY is an audio visual artist, filmmaker and owner of the lifestyle and music label Haus of Altr. Both MoMa Ready and the label draw inspiration from the energy of deep house, techno and rave, with an underbelly of skateboarding culture. Using soulful vocal track, deep 909 beats, rolling acid cuts and unmatched energy, MoMa gets his point across.
