It’s hard to think of a scholar who has had a bigger impact on the art of our times than Saidiya Hartman. The Columbia professor is best known for her method of writing history that she calls “critical fabulation,” a way of using theory and speculative storytelling to fill silences and omissions left in the archives. Specifically, it’s a way of painting a picture of people who were prevented from leaving straightforward material traces, often those who were oppressed or enslaved.

Hartman’s homages have been many. Last year, Simone Leigh curated an exhibition titled “Critical Fabulation” at the Art Institute of Chicago, and in 2020, a group of artists—including Garrett Bradley, Arthur Jafa, and Cameron Rowland—celebrated her at MoMA PS1. In 2023, one of MoMA’s permanent collection galleries was themed “Critical Fabulations,” too. And that’s just to name the most explicit citations: Her way of working can be seen in everything from research-based practices, to work on colonial archives, to speculative experiments merging fact and fiction.
 
Now, for the first time, Hartman is helming an artwork of her own. In October, she debuted a performance she wrote titled Minor Music at the End of the World, a three-part work that imagines the end of white supremacy. It is deeply collaborative, featuring cinematic elements by Arthur Jafa, sculptures by Precious Okoyomon, and sounds by Peter Born. Cameron Rowland is credited as the “Attendant of the Archive,” and André Holland and Okwui Okpokwasili are the lead performers. Recently, Minor Music had a run in Venice where, thematically, it echoes the Biennale’s main show, titled “In Minor Keys.”