Mapping Malcolm: A Centennial Series, Part II

Join us on Thursday, April 10th at 6:30 PM for the second installment of Mapping Malcolm: A Centennial Series, curated by Najha Zigbi-Johnson. This engaging, three-part public series dives deep into Malcolm X's lasting influence, examining his impact not only on the Harlem community but also on the broader landscape of New York City and beyond.

In Part II of this series, The Radical Imagination and Black Aesthetics: A World Building Exercise, we'll bring together artist Awol Erizku, designer Curry Hackett, architect Jerome Haferd, and artist Helina Metaferia to discuss Black aesthetics as a site for radical world-building. Drawing from the themes of Mapping Malcolm, the conversation will examine how Black spatial practices, historical iconography, and transnationalism shapes contemporary art, design, and architecture. Together, we will consider how Malcolm X’s vision continues to reverberate across disciplines, not only as a historical blueprint but also as an evolving, creative force that shapes public space, cultural production, and the future of Black radical thought. At a time when the built environment remains a contested site of power, exclusion, and erasure, this discussion insists on the necessity of art and the radical imagination as a liberatory tool.

The program will be followed by a soulful DJ set by Tara, blending music and history to close out the evening.

About Mapping Malcolm:

“For Harlem is where he worked and where he struggled and fought—his home of homes, where his heart was, and where his people are.” Nearly sixty years since the martyrdom of Malcolm X, these words from Ossie Davis’s eulogy remind us that Malcolm’s political and religious beliefs and conceptions of culture have profoundly shaped and been shaped by Harlem. Mapping Malcolm continues the project of reinscribing Malcolm X’s memory and legacy in the present by exploring his commitment to community building and his articulation of a global power analysis as it continues to manifest across New York City today. More specifically, the book explores the limits and possibilities of the archive, the political, material, and philosophical legacy of the Black radical tradition, the Black diaspora, and the state. Oriented toward sovereignty and liberation, Mapping Malcolm brings together artists, community organizers, and scholars to consider the politics of Black space-making in Harlem through a range of historical, cultural, and anti-imperialist worldviews designed to offer new, reparatory pedagogical possibilities. Together, they reconfigure how we understand, employ, and carry forward Malcolm X’s sociopolitical, cross-cultural analyses of justice and power as an everyday praxis in the built environment and beyond.

Events are free and open to all. Registration does not guarantee entrance, so we recommend that you arrive early.

Host or Publisher The Africa Center