The Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA) has announced its upcoming season of exhibitions and programs for 2026. The program includes artists exploring politics, social transformation, and personal histories. Included are a newly commissioned work by Dread Scott, a comprehensive exhibition by Bay Area architecture studio Rael San Fratello, the first major U.S. institutional exhibition for surrealist painter GaHee Park, and a one-woman show by celebrated poet Denice Frohman. [...]
[...] Dread Scott: The Body Politic shines a light on the conflicts between American patriotism, political issues and the role of radicalism to transform power imbalances. Dread Scott, born Scott W. Tyler in 1965, adopted his professional name as a nod to Dred Scott, the enslaved African American made famous by the landmark 1857 U.S. Supreme Court case Dred Scott v. Sandford. Scott’s new commissions include a monumental work made up of dozens of ethereal body prints and a durational performance piece in which a uniformed guard protects a U.S. flag. Fight the Power (2023) is an example of inked body prints — a collection of arms, unified by raised fists, (the universal symbol of the Black Power movement), representing solidarity and resistance against systemic oppression. Scott shows us that art and radical social transformation are inseparable. As a companion to the exhibition, a related series of films will be presented by the author, programmer, and Criterion Collection Curatorial Director Ashley Clark. Drawing from Clark’s new book, The World of Black Film: A Journey Through Cinematic Blackness in 100 Films, the series includes films from the ’60s through the ’80s, representing a diverse period in global Black cinema.
