Tiona Nekkia McClodden, The Labyrinth 1.0, 2017

The Labyrinth 1.0 is a poetic film essay that cites writer and poet Brad Johnson's poem "The Labyrinth," published in 1995 in the anthology Milking Black Bull. Sourcing 16mm surveillance footage, 1970s tearoom porn, and structuralist film footage shot in North Philadelphia, the work visually explores the concept of the labyrinth space as a site for cruising and gestural based desire.

Commissioned in 2017 as part of ALTERNATE ENDINGS, RADICAL BEGINNINGS, a program of seven videos prioritizing Black narratives within the ongoing AIDS epidemic curated by Erin Christovale and Vivian Crockett for Visual AIDS.

About the artist

Tiona Nekkia McClodden is a curator, visual artist, and filmmaker whose work explores and critiques issues at the intersections of race, gender, sexuality, and social commentary. Themes examined in McClodden's films and works have been re-memory and more recently narrative biomythography, and shared ideas, values, and beliefs within the African Diaspora—what she calls, “Black mentifact.” McClodden’s work is interested in exploring intersubjectivities within Black communities as a tool for creating insider perspectives within film, time based works, and objects. McClodden lives and works in Philadelphia, PA.

︎ Artist Statement

︎ Watch a conversation with Tiona Nekkia McClodden, Tourmaline, and Brontez Purnell at the Whitney Museum of American Art

︎ Watch a conversation with Tiona Nekkia McClodden, artist Charles Ryan Long, and AIDS advocate Rae Lewis-Thornton at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago