SJSU Art Galleries Tuesday Night Lecture: Alanna Airitam: The Questions That Won't Leave Us Alone

An acclaimed weekly lecture series brings in artists, designers, and critical theorists from around the world, broadening the students’ experiential base and complementing local offerings. All lectures and exhibitions are open to the general public free of charge. Unless otherwise indicated, all events are in person on Tuesday evenings from 5-6pm, SJSU Art Building #133.

Alanna Airitam: The Questions That Won't Leave Us Alone

Alanna Airitam is a Tucson based, self-taught photographic artist whose work explores the questions that persist at the intersection of history, memory, power, and human possibility. Through photography, archival research, and material experimentation, she investigates how societies determine who is seen, who is forgotten, and what these choices reveal about our understanding of one another.

Rooted in the traditions of Black studio photography and informed by Black feminist thinkers including Tina M. Campt and Christina Sharpe, Airitam's practice examines the enduring effects of colonialism, exclusion, and historical erasure. Her work is driven by a persistent curiosity about how human beings can be capable of profound creativity, care, and beauty while simultaneously sustaining systems of domination, violence, and forgetting.