Edgar Arceneaux, Until, Until, Until . . .
October 17, 20247:30 pm
October 18, 20247:30 pm
October 19, 20247:30 pm
Theatrical haze is used throughout the performance.
About the Performance
Edgar Arceneaux is a contemporary artist working in Los Angeles, whose primary materials are histories and memories marred by gaps in logic, clichés, and erasures. Working within these gaps, Arceneaux applies a surreal, dream-like lens to pry open the messy contents of history, and pull what we think we already know into new shapes.
Arceneaux’s live performance Until, Until, Until . . . restages Broadway legend Ben Vereen’s infamous 1981 blackface performance at Ronald Reagan’s inaugural gala, and its aftermath. As an homage to vaudevillian Bert Williams, one of America’s first mainstream Black entertainers, Ben Vereen performed a moving tribute to Williams on national television, donned in blackface make up, as was required of Black vaudevillian performers in the early 20th century. In the first half of his performance, Vereen performed a song and dance routine in the vaudevillian style. The second half of his show contained biting commentary about the history of Black performance in the US, assimilation into white norms, and white supremacy, but woefully, that section was edited out of the national broadcast, leading to a national outrage and Vereen’s career derailment. Vereen was never allowed to tell his side of the story . . . until now.
A multilayered, abstract fever dream of a play, Arceneaux’s Until, Until, Until . . . invites audiences to directly experience Vereen’s censored performance, deemed too dangerous to air on national television.
Edgar Arceneaux’s Until, Until, Until . . . was commissioned by Performa and MIT’s Vera List Visual Arts Center for the Performa 15 Biennial. Now, 10 years since its debut, this restaging is an opportunity to reflect on what’s changed in the years since.
The MCA presentation is organized by Laura Paige Kyber, Assistant Curator of Performance.
Access Information
Seating is general admission. Some seats include access to café tables, and will be offered first-come, first-served. If you need mobility assistance, please speak with an MCA staff member.
Theatrical haze is used throughout the performance.
English CART caption and audio description are available for the performance on Saturday, October 19.
![Audio description available.](https://visit.mcachicago.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Audio-Description_72x72.webp)
About the Artist
![Portrait of a man with short curly hair in an outdoor location](https://visit.mcachicago.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Edgar-headshot-200x300.jpg)
Edgar Arceneaux. Photo: Sage Causie.
Edgar Arceneaux (b. 1972, Los Angeles) works in the fields of drawing, sculpture, installation, performance, and video; often exploring connections between historical events and present-day truths. Arceneaux has had solo exhibitions at The Kitchen (NYC), Studio Museum in Harlem, New York; the Vera List Center at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; and Museum für Gegenwartskunst in Basel, Switzerland; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Linz, Austria. His work has also been presented at the Museum of Modern Art (NYC), Bronx Museum, Performa 15, the Whitney Museum, Astrup Fearnley Museum of Art in Oslo, San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, and MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, Massachusetts, among other venues. Arceneaux’s work has been collected at the Whitney Museum, New York; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Ludwig Museum, Cologne; Walker Art Center; Minneapolis Institute of Art; Orange County Museum of Art, and Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Arceneaux attended the California Institute of the Arts (MFA, 2001), Fachhochschule Aachen (2000), the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture (1999), and Art Center College of Design (BFA, 1996).