651 ARTS is proud to present André M. Zachery (Creator, Against Gravity: Flying Afrikans + Other Urban Legends & Artistic Director, Renegade Performance Group) and Ayinde Jean-Baptiste (Producing Director & Co-Writer, Against Gravity) as leaders and facilitators of this movement-based workshop investigating themes of Black masculinity and all the multiplicities it exists in Brooklyn, Chicago, and America.

Facilitated by renowned poet literary, theorist, and professor, Rosamond S. King, this literary workshop will explore the profound writings of Gwendolyn Brooks and reflect on how her work remains relevant today.

Participants will then compose and share poetry of their own. This workshop will also offer space for Black expressive resistance and imagination, exploring how Black poetry and literature bring new perspectives to narratives and stories relevant to the community.

About Gwendolyn Brooks

Gwendolyn Brooks is one of the most profound poets and authors of the 20th century. Born in 1917 in Topeka, Kansas, she migrated to Chicago, where she documented the interiority of the Black people who also called the city home. Brooks is the first among the choral ancestral and contemporary Black voices included in this season’s upcoming piece, Against Gravity: Flying Afrikans + Other Urban Legends. In this workshop, writer Rosamond S. King will guide attendees to engage Brooks’ writing found in the performance and reflect on its contemporary relevance before they compose poetry of their own.

This workshop is Part Two of a three-part workshop series, leading up to the World Premiere of Against Gravity: Flying Afrikans + Other Urban Legends in January 2025.

Benji was directed by Chicago native Coodie Simmons and his collaborator, New Orleans born, Chike Ozah. The powerful film recalls the life and impact of rising Chicago basketball star Ben “Benji” Wilson who was ranked as the number 1 player in the country in the Summer of 1984 and was deemed to be the one that would make it to the league and put Chicago on the map. Benji’s life was cut tragically short at the age of 17-years-old when, during a brief scuffle, he was shot and killed – and with him went the hopes and dreams of his family, classmates, and Black Chicago.

Conceived by Renegade Performance Group’s Artistic Director and renowned choreographer André M. Zachery, & developed in collaboration with Ayinde Jean-Baptiste for DuSable City, Against Gravity: Flying Afrikans + Other Urban Legends is a solo performance that uses movement to explore the self-examination of Black masculinity through history, memory, text, poetry and geography.

It is a personal narrative that begins with Zachery’s youth in 1980-90’s Chicago and intersects with three legendary figures: Fred Hampton, Ben (Benji) Wilson and Harold Washington. Guided in part by the oracular voice of Chicago ancestor laureate Gwendolyn Brooks, the performer grapples with the legacy of these three men — a revolutionary, an athletic phenomenon and a post-Civil Rights era politician, all viewed in their primes as messiahs.