Christina Quarles Responds to Du Bois's 'The Souls of Black Folk' in New Afterall Publication

Afterall has released a new publication pairing W. E. B. Du Bois's foundational 1903 text 'The Souls of Black Folk' with contemporary artist Christina Quarles. The book, part of the 'Two Works' series, juxtaposes Du Bois's chapter 'Of Our Spiritual Strivings' with Quarles's visual poetics. Du Bois's work, a cornerstone of African American literature, introduced the concept of 'double consciousness'—the experience of seeing oneself through the eyes of a racist society. Quarles, whose practice engages with ambiguity and multiple subject positions, reinterprets and inverts this idea. The publication is available via After8Books and Koenig. It follows previous 'Two Works' pairings such as Hannah Quinlan & Rosie Hastings with Leo Bersani, and Julie Mehretu with Henri Lefebvre.