SLO Muesum of Art's Outlandish exhibit highlights water's importance in BIPOC communities 

On a gallery's walls in downtown San Luis Obispo, the Outlandish exhibit ties almost every creative outlet together to enable gallerygoers to view the importance of water through the lens of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of color) voices.

The San Luis Obispo Museum of Art's (SLOMA) newest exhibit features April Banks' works that incorporate film, mixed media, ritual, and sculpture to prompt viewers to ponder the relationship between nature, labor, and leisure.

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• Photo By Samantha Herrera
• TIDE WALKERS Before entering the San Luis Obispo Museum of Art, the Outlandish exhibit begins on the lawn with Tidewalker showing three figures holding a basket of water above their heads.

"It really starts to go into the imaginary and the speculative, and I feel like that was intentional because I feel like imagination, dreaming, daydreaming are all methods and mechanisms for change that we often don't include in conversation," the artist told New Times. "So I just wanted to go into the sea of an imaginary world that really challenges things about colonialism."

Outlandish takes inspiration from a previous show Banks worked on with R.A.C.E. Matters SLO called Braiding Water. That 2023 exhibition aimed to honor the varied and multifaceted relationships that communities across the Central Coast have with water, as well as nurture a sense of the interconnections and interdependence that link everyone together.

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• Photo By Samantha Herrera
• IN THE CLOUDS SLOMA's exhibit, Outlandish, takes viewers to the imaginary world of Yemaluna where the clouds are a conjunction between the ethereal and nature, holding immense amounts of water, yet dispersed with the wind.

Building off of Braiding Water in a way that felt special to her, Banks said that making the Outlandish exhibit an interactive experience would leave a longer-lasting impression for those who came to see it. She pulled out every form of creativity she had to bring this show to life.

"Because this was my own work, I really wanted to create from a different place, a more intuitive place and not be so attached to research," she said. "I definitely tried new mediums—it's my first time working with clay, which you don't actually see in the show, but I made prints from the clay."

SLOMA Chief Curator and Director of Education Emma Saperstein told New Times that community members can view this show at their own pace, but she encourages visitors to take a look at the front lawn because that's where the exhibit actually begins.

"The Tidewalker and the exhibition are connected. Tidewalker will remain on the lawn for a full year, and they're sort of meant to work in conjunction with each other," she said. "The experience also has a six-minute meditation experience, a sound piece in conjunction with the video, so it's easy to stay engaged the whole time."

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• Photo By Samantha Herrera
• INTERACTIVE EXPERIENCE Through storytelling, ritual, meditation, film, and mixed media, Outlandish is an interactive journey exploring the relationship between nature, labor, and leisure when it comes to water's use in community.

Showgoers will take a trip into the imaginary world of Yemaluna, which Banks said combines the name of Yemaya, the ocean deity in African Diasporic spiritual practices, and lunar, referring to the moon.

Visiting the cloud island, community members witness the lives of Yemaluna's residents and watch as they migrate every four years on Feb. 29.

"Clouds allude to the conjunction between the ethereal and nature, holding immense amounts of water yet dispersed with the wind, they are universal, drifting, wandering, and borderless," according to SLOMA's materials about the exhibit.

Banks said Yemaluna is universal, drifting, wandering, and borderless, which evokes imagination, daydreaming, and wonder as well as being a metaphor for a "geography of freedom."

Originally from Los Angeles, Banks said she's been traveling up the coast to SLO for years and it feels like a second home to her, almost as Yemaluna does. Bringing Outlandish to SLOMA just seemed to make sense to her, especially since the musuem hosted Braiding Water, and she said that "it just felt like a natural progression."

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• Photo By Samantha Herrera
• WATER'S IMPORTANCE Artist April Banks gives gallerygoers the opportunity to view the importance of water in communities through the lens of BIPOC community members.

Outlandish is only the first exhibition of Yemaluna, and Banks said she's already planning for continuation.

"I definitely see going further with the prints that I made from clay. Also I would love to see the Tidewalker sculptures out on the lawn in motion," she said. "I'm also working on an almanac for the show, which will hopefully come out before the show is done, and I plan to do that every four years on leap year." Δ

Staff Writer Samantha Herrera is cloud watching. Send blue skies to [email protected].