Culture House and Mixed People's History proudly present Ancestral Ri[gh]tes, on view from July 9 to August 6, 2022. 

The project establishes a foundational history for Mixed people from all backgrounds to connect their unique experiences and give agency over their intersectional identities. This is an expression of their right to have ancestral rites.

Honoring six Multiracial ancestors throughout history from 1579 to 2020, Ancestral Ri[gh]tes gives homage to these artists, activists, trailblazers, outsiders, and saints as they persevered to make their Multiracial community more vibrant. Mixed People’s History aims to bring visibility to Multiracial & Interethnic communities and their experiences by community building through collected media, history, and resources.

About Mixed People’s History

Mixed People’s History is a collaborative art and documentary project led by a bicoastal team of biracial and multiethnic creatives who want to broaden the dialogue on how the world frames issues of race and ethnicity as it relates to those who exist cross-culturally. Every year, more children are born from interracial families. According to the Pew Research Center, 9 million Americans (3% of the total population) categorized themselves as two or more races in the 2010 Census. And in 2015, one-in-seven U.S. infants (14% of all births) were multiracial or multiethnic, nearly triple since 1980. Although their population keeps growing, mixed people are left to navigate on their own. Our experiences as racial, ethnic, and culturally intersectional individuals have been defined by historic racial constructs that offer little to no acknowledgment of the existence that we were born into. Through its various projects, Mixed People’s History aims to create a sense of place and shared experience for those of us who never felt comfortable filling in or fitting into one box.

The team behind Mixed People’s History includes:

• Jessica Jones is a documentary filmmaker focusing on cultural and social justice narratives. She believes in the power of media to expose stories and truth, spark conversations, and break down barriers. Jessica grew up in Dallas with her white mother and her Black father. Growing up, she knew few others who identified as biracial or multiracial, which was deeply confusing and challenging where and how she fits in.

• Paul Bothwell is a documentary photographer and filmmaker whose work focuses on raising the visibility of largely unseen communities, ranging from migrant rural Chinese laborers to suburban Maryland immigrant youth. Born to a Chinese mother and Scottish father in the San Francisco Bay Area, confusion about his identity arose in his youth when standardized testing only allowed one race to be identified.

• Imani Karpowich-Smith, a Berkeley native, is an interdisciplinary artist and videographer with a background in library work. Often mistaken as white, her Black identity always clashed with people’s expectations. The questions and assertions she encountered claimed they knew her better than herself and denied her heritage. More than frustrated and hungry to find others who understood her experience, Imani grew up dreaming of creating work for people like herself.

• Josef Palermo is an intermedia artist specializing in experiential site-specific projects. His work reveals and recontextualizes identity constructs, from the individualized self to the macro collective social structure. He is a second-generation "mixed" American born to a biracial mother and a multiethnic father and is based in Washington, DC.

The gallery is open to the public through August 6, 2022 on Saturdays from 11 am – 2 pm and by appointment.