Discovering How Black Women Might Forge a Path to Freedom
The “Loophole of Retreat” symposium at the Venice Biennale demonstrated that the personal is not only political; it’s also where most of humanity lives.
By Seph Rodney, 2022
VENICE — To properly discuss the “Loophole of Retreat” symposium organized by Rashida Bumbray and Simone Leigh, which took place in Venice, Italy, a few weeks ago, it is only right to discuss the origin of this title. It is the heading of one chapter in the autobiographical narrative of a formerly enslaved Black woman, Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, published in 1861. In it Jacobs describes a crawlspace she lived in for seven years after her escape as a “loophole of retreat.” This is a paradoxical position to be in: on one hand having escaped the crushingly brutal conditions of slavery, yet on the other hand being constrained in this space for seven years, limited in movement, voice, and almost all possible expressions of her will. However, Jacobs’s predicament didn’t, and couldn’t, indicate the breadth and depth that the gathered artists, activists, curators, academics, performers, and researchers would reach in exploring the idea of freedom. Jacobs’s loophole was only a philosophical and rhetorical launching point for a series of conversations and presentations organized around the production of aesthetic, historical, and well-researched knowledge about, and pertaining to, Black women. That’s the back story. What it felt like to be there was almost as profound as the premise of the symposium.
The events all took place from October 7 to 9 at the Fondazione Giorgio Cini on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore in the Venetian lagoon, about an eight-minute boat ride via the shuttles provided. Most of the observers and participants stayed in hotels in the neighborhood of San Marco, from which these shuttles launched each morning. I didn’t know — and indeed didn’t need to know — exactly where to find the Loophole taxis along a very long wharf, with many berths for public transportation, because I could see the long line of Black women making their way to the proper place, dressed in vivid and flamboyant colors and chatting amiably with each other. The cavalcade of Black women visually transformed the Venetian island. Rather than primarily constituting a space of touristic flânerie and transactional consumption, an atmosphere of real delight and enthusiasm filled those mornings and afternoons, as the women made their way to and from Cini, and as people discovered colleagues who were also present and engaged in excited conversation with them. Every day I was surprised and gratified to find people I had worked with, written about, or corresponded with through social media platforms. That convivial spirit was made even more manifest that first morning (and each subsequent one) when we gathered in the main hall and Bumbray opened the proceedings by welcoming us with a tambourine. Keeping time at her side, she sang, “I’ve been to the river and I’ve been baptized.” ( … )