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Untitled Interactions: Confronting Racism In A Rural Community, Christina Hunt Wood

MFA in Visual Arts Theses

As an African American living in socially contentious times, I am driven to make sense of the hegemonic structure of my own rural, predominantly white community. I have increasingly become aware of the behaviors that reinforce racial stereotypes and thwart opportunities for cultural intervention. Through the collecting of memories, archives, and observations, patterns form and act as evidence of deeply entrenched biases. In my videos, actual events, or “untitled interactions” are reenacted, and focus on the complexity of bigotry. Inspired by pop culture genres, such as silent film, cinema, and music video I create a visual language that gently reveals …