Black Quantum Futurism (BQF) is a literary and artistic collective composed of

Moor Mother Camae Ayewa, better known by her stage name Moor Mother, is an American poet, musician, and activist from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She is one half of the collective Black Quantum Futurism, along with Rasheedah Phillips, and co-leads the grou ...

(Camae Ayewa) and

Rasheedah Phillips Rasheedah Phillips is an American artist, author, community activist and lawyer based in Philadelphia. She is the creator of The Afrofuturist Affair and, together with Camae Ayewa, the Black Quantum Futurism multidisciplinary artist collective. ...

, two queer Black women from and based in

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

. It is also a name for the set of

Afrofuturist Afrofuturism is a cultural aesthetic, and philosophy of science and history that explores the intersection of the African diaspora culture with science and technology. It addresses themes and concerns of the African diaspora through technocultu ...

theoretical frameworks and methodologies proposed by the collective.

Artistic philosophy

The collective has published a book, ''Black Quantum Futurism: Theory & Practice (Volume 1)'' which proposes "a new approach to living and experiencing reality by way of the manipulation of space-time in order to see into possible futures, and/or collapse space-time into a desired future in order to bring about that future’s reality." The book argues that quantum mechanical interpretations of

time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...

spacetime In physics, spacetime is a mathematical model that combines the three dimensions of space and one dimension of time into a single four-dimensional manifold. Spacetime diagrams can be used to visualize relativistic effects, such as why differen ...

causality Causality (also referred to as causation, or cause and effect) is influence by which one event, process, state, or object (''a'' ''cause'') contributes to the production of another event, process, state, or object (an ''effect'') where the cau ...

, and

interactions Interaction is action that occurs between two or more objects, with broad use in philosophy and the sciences. It may refer to: Science * Interaction hypothesis, a theory of second language acquisition * Interaction (statistics) * Interactions o ...

are more in agreement with Afrocentric understandings of these same phenomena than with Western ones, and that methodologies which merge these ideas will be able to counter Eurocentric,

colonialist Colonialism is a practice or policy of control by one people or power over other people or areas, often by establishing colonies and generally with the aim of economic dominance. In the process of colonisation, colonisers may impose their relig ...

structures and conceptions of reality. BQF's work centers the subjective and cultural nature of time itself, and its material impact as a tool for both the oppression and the survival and liberation of Black people and communities. They claim that

Manifest Destiny Manifest destiny was a cultural belief in the 19th century in the United States, 19th-century United States that American settlers were destined to expand across North America. There were three basic tenets to the concept: * The special vir ...

and westward expansion were as much about time as space; a laying claim not just to the land but to the future and who determines it. For Phillips, who also works as a housing attorney at Community Legal Services, eviction serves as yet another way to cut Black people off from their future, especially in a city where 70% of evictees are Black women. However, in contrast to the ways that Western systems of power attempt to deprive certain communities of their place in a linear future, BQF draws on indigenous African cultural understandings of time from across the Continent and the diaspora to explore cyclical and interactive notions of time that link together the past, present, and future. The music of

(Ayewa's solo musical project) applies BQF methodologies to musical composition and electronic noise manipulation.

Projects and awards

In June 2016, the founders of BQF opened th
Community Futures Lab
an "afrofuturist community center" in North Philadelphia where they lead workshops and teach-ins, provide space for artistic practice, and fight gentrification in the area. In the face of increasing displacement caused by gentrification, they invite community members not only to record stories and histories, but also to imagine possible futures for the neighborhood, and to record those as well. In September 2017, in collaboration with Icebox Project Space, BQF created a two-day program and interactive exhibit titled Time Camp 001, "exploring time, alternative temporalities, time travel, and temporal shifts". They were one of five 2021

Knight Foundation The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, also known as the Knight Foundation, is an American non-profit foundation that provides grants for journalism, communities, and the arts. The organization was founded as the Knight Memorial Education ...

Arts + Tech Fellows. BQF was selected as the winner of the 2021

CERN The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN (; ; ), is an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world. Established in 1954, it is based in a northwestern suburb of Gene ...

Collide artist's residency, which pairs them with particle physics researchers to produce a new work exploring charge,

parity Parity may refer to: * Parity (computing) ** Parity bit in computing, sets the parity of data for the purpose of error detection ** Parity flag in computing, indicates if the number of set bits is odd or even in the binary representation of the r ...

and

time reversal symmetry T-symmetry or time reversal symmetry is the theoretical symmetry of physical laws under the transformation of time reversal, : T: t \mapsto -t. Since the second law of thermodynamics states that entropy increases as time flows toward the future ...

External links

Music of Moor Mother

Moor Mother's Website

Black Quantum Futurism Homepage

References

{{Reflist Afrofuturism