Saturday 15th July, All Day, with performance at 7pm: The Black Alchemisphere

A—Z and Shoreditch Arts Club presents a chapter from the Historical Futurist Alyse Stone’s ground-breaking solo show: The Black Alchemisphere.

The Black Alchemisphere, a time-parallel fiction told by Stone is presented as a walkable journey in several London locations in July 2023. Working with the nomadic curatorial platform A---Z, the various places are central as a device to tell the story and transport the viewer. Stone constructs her detailed universe of Black Alchemy and auto-theoretical science fiction to teleport the viewer to an alternate universe through time travel. 

At Shoreditch Arts Club, The Origin Story presents three moving image interludes where the audience is transported and meet the main character from Stone's novel: Selika. A set of two paintings accompanies the mise en scene designed as small portals/introductions, as well as a tapestry.

A performance reading will take place from 7pm in the cinema space.

In this universe, Black Women are the main characters, history is reimagined, and the central persona, Selika Laveski (the alias of a real historical figure) discovers the deep well of her powers and the unlimited possibilities in this new time dimension. 

Designing the spaces in various acts/chapters, The Waiting Room, teleports the audience in this new universe. A short walk away, The Black Alchemist Boudoir includes: Dark Matter embracing the viewer in an oasis of new cosmic materiality, and The Origin Story, a film installation. Crafted by Stone for the past three years, this parallel universe installation and book The Origin of The Black Alchemisphere be released in 2024. 

Alyse Stone’s mural-sized paintings, material evolutionary sculptures, sci-fi writing, and large-scale installations merge to build worlds that foreground the Black imagination in an entirely new terrain. Moments of history in the present are recreated through both virtual and physical storytelling in a method that she has defined as Historical. Informed by personal histories, Stone’s process of time-parallel fictionning is cemented with archival research and storytelling through the lens of escape, discovery, and freedom.

Members have access to all events in our programme.