Umar Rashid reimagines contemporary history—particularly the saga of the fictional Frenglish Empire. Through this fabrication, Rashid becomes the community griot or shaman, a harbinger of realities that were forgotten or erased but might reenter the matrix through the portal of his artistic practice. The title of a multimedia sculpture from 2022, a jumbotron envisioned as a missive from space, attests to that project’s urgency: Sink or Synchronize. The voice from the outer realm of the cosmic overlord that compels you. I spoke with Rashid in a Thai restaurant across the street from MoMA PS1 after visiting Ancien Regime Change 4, 5, and 6, his solo show on view at the museum.
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