From April 4–7, 2024, The University of Tulsa will present Sovereign Futures, a four-day convening of leading artists, academics, curators, and minds that will unfold over time and in multiple locations. Organized by Visiting Curator Allison Glenn, Sovereign Futures presents a constellation of artists’ projects, performances, meals, and panel discussions that provoke dialogues on sovereignty through the lens of contemporary practices.

Convening sites include The Osage Nation’s Harvest Land Farm; the historically Black pioneer town of Boley, Oklahoma, home to the first Black-owned electric company and the first Black-owned bank in the United States; Guthrie Green, Tulsa’s urban park and performance space, and interdisciplinary artist Kalup Linzy’s Queen Rose Art House, a social and critical art space that hosts performances, exhibitions, and short-term artist residencies.

Curatorial advisors to the project include Kalyn Fay Barnoski (Cherokee Nation enrollee, Muscogee Creek descent), Assistant Curator, Native American Art, Philbrook Museum of Art; visual artist Yatika Starr Fields (Cherokee, Muscogee Creek, Osage), Caleb Gayle, Professor, Northeastern University, School of Journalism and Contributing Writer, New York Times Magazine; with insight from Jeff Van Hanken, Department Chair & Wellspring Associate Professor of Film Studies, The University of Tulsa.

During the four-day gathering in Spring 2024, artist-led projects will explore themes of sovereignty through the lens of food, land, speculative futures, and histories of the place that is now called Oklahoma.

Generous support for Sovereign Futures is provided by George Kaiser Family Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, The University of Tulsa, the City of Tulsa, Halona Development LLC, and Village Travel. Support for Territory Indigenous Art is provided by Hugh Pickens and Travis Moore. Support for Ashanti Chaplin’s Dust to Dirge: Earth Elegy is provided by Katie Kruger and Louise Short. Special thanks to the Tulsa Artist Fellowship (TAF).