. . .and a word from Linda Imani Barrett, Artistic Director
Legacy Arts Project

Why do this performance of Flying Africans?  It has been on my heart for many years as a child I would hear me
grandmother talk about flying people.  When I read Toni Morrison's book about folks flying from Solomon's line of children, it clicked in my spirit !  I saw Julie Dash's movie and my spirit leaped. I began asking questions of elders from the south and started doing research!  I found out that my family last name Holmes was from the coastal lowlands of South Carolina! 

 

I began to learn about these Gullah/Geechee People and the importance of them holding on to the culture and that many of these people were in a fight to hold on their lands because so much of it is beach front Real Estate!  Many white folks have been snatching the land from them by using trickery such as raising taxes creating gated communities so the Gullah/Geechee community in some areas can not get to their grave sites anymore because they cannot cross the land!  They are  in a fight down there AND NO ONE SEEMS TO KNOW! Hilton Head has been taken St. John's island is almost gone and they want St. Helena where Queen Quet lives now!

 

The story of flight with African American has always existed in "our stories" such as Steal away to Jesus where we can run away to Freedom spiritually or make maps in quilts to use to runaway or the unrest  on slaves ships and plantations or follow Harriet Tubman " Old Moses" and the North Star.  Look up flying and flight in relationship to Black Folks we were always trying to figure out a way to escape bondage.  The bottom line here for me and the message I want to convey is do not forget who you are!  Many of the folks who will be sitting in the audiences are descendants of these people and they too can rise and fly over their circumstance no matter what hardships and troubles they are going through just remember these folks and stretch out your wings and take to the sky!

 

This is not a 'performance" but a "transformance" of hope and renewed strength and a wake up call  a reminder of who were are as a people!

The problems we see in our neighborhoods is a direct link to the fact "we have forgotten who were are as a people!"

Thank You for Your Time!

 

Imani