Rashid Johnson: Antoine's Organ - Videos and Programming

Videos installed within Antoine’s Organ 

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North side:
Samuel in Space, 2013 
Color video with sound, transferred from 16mm film 4 minutes, 55 seconds 
Courtesy of the Artist

West side:  
The Sweet, Sweet Runner, 2010 
Color video with sound, transferred from 16 mm film 
3 minutes, 19 seconds 
Courtesy the Artist and Monique Meloche Gallery, Chicago 

An actor runs through New York streets and Central Park, weaving through dog walkers, crossing a bridge, and briefly locking eyes with another runner. His actions, subtle yet tense, unfold to the score of Melvin Van Peebles’s 1971 film Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song, whose soundtrack was composed by Earth, Wind & Fire.  

In Van Peebles’s landmark film, the Black protagonist is on the run, trying to reach the US–Mexico border to escape both the authorities and the Hell’s Angels. The 1971 film’s raw, fast-cut aesthetic, fragmented sound, and percussive score heighten the urgency of escape, transforming mundane spaces like city streets and alleyways. Johnson similarly uses music to heighten the stakes of a Black man’s banal daily jog. The shifting camera perspective positions the viewer in a dual role—both surveilling and engaging with the runner—blurring the boundary between observer and observed.

South side: 
Watching “The End of Blackness”, 2007 
Color video with sound 3 minutes, 5 seconds 
Collection of the Artist

East side: 
Threeness, 2005 
Color video with sound 
3 minutes, 10 seconds 
Collection of the Artist

Performances in the Galleries 

Rashid Johnson, Antoine’s Organ, 2016/2026 
Performances take place the last weekend of each month: 
Friday, 5:30–7:30 pm and Sunday, noon–2 pm 
Included with gallery admission.
See the full schedule of performances here.