Enjoy a night of conversation inspired by artist Gary Simmons’s sculptural installation, Recapturing Memories of the Black Ark. Reflecting on Black Miami performance histories from booming Overtown aka “Harlem of the South” through the development of the unique “Miami Bass” sound of the ‘80s, Filmmaker Marlon Johnson, DJ Jason Panton, and On-Air Radio Host Supa Cindy will come together for a discussion moderated by Carla Hill. They will explore the movements that shaped the unique sounds and performance venues of Miami with a special focus on the contributions of Caribbean culture. From Liberty City to Carol City, and other historic Black neighborhoods across South Florida, learn how Black cultural production shaped the Magic City.
About the Black Ark
Gary Simmons’s sculptural installation Recapturing Memories of the Black Ark consists of a stage and speakers that, when activated, serve as a venue for live performances. The speakers are encased with wood salvaged from the streets of New Orleans’s Tremé neighborhood in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The objects bear the spray-painted traces of that history, just as they hold the memory of past performance activations. The title of the work references Lee “Scratch” Perry’s legendary Kingston studio, the Black Ark, while the black star motif on the stage gestures toward the Black Star Line, a passenger vessel route launched in 1919 by the Jamaican political leader Marcus Garvey as a way to facilitate personal and economic ties between Africa and Black people throughout the world.
These connections across time and space imbue Simmons’s platform with the suggestion of Black diasporic unity. Like Perry’s studio, much of which was constructed using repurposed materials and DIY fabrication, Simmons’s installation provides a platform for artists to come together and forge new sound out of reclaimed parts, symbolically actualizing Garvey’s dream of solidarity. The important role of music and dance in fulfilling this dream is further underscored by the motif’s allusion to the hip-hop duo Black Star, a collaboration between Mos Def and Talib Kweli.
Each time the work is installed, Simmons invites the exhibiting venue to program a performance series inspired by local performance histories. As Simmons explains, “At the end of [each] performance the speakers are left in place as a kind of ghost of that performance.”
About Carla Hill
Carla Hill nurtures her love of arts and entertainment through her work as the host of the Health Channel’s “Hope is Here,” a national television presenter for PBS, commercial actor and model. She’s a board member for Armour Dance Theatre and serves on The Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts’ Onyx Women community advisory group. Hill has served as a member of the community advisory boards for the Junior League of Miami and Arthur and Polly Mays Conservatory of the Arts.
Hill is a graduate of the nationally renowned New World School of the Arts high school where she was a musical theatre major. After graduating from Florida State University, she began her career in education as an English teacher at her high school alma mater. She received her Master of Science in Counseling from Barry University and shortly thereafter began a career in arts administration as the director of national programs for YoungArts. Hill herself was a winner in musical theatre with the YoungArts program and has maintained a relationship of over 30 years with the organization.
She’s a graduate of Georgetown University’s prestigious 11th executive certificate program cohort in diversity, equity, and inclusion. When she’s not working or serving the community, she is planning her next Caribbean carnival vacation with her husband Marlon.
About Marlon Johnson
Marlon Johnson is a nine-time Emmy award-winning producer and director. He has worked on award-winning documentary films exploring music and cultural issues like “Symphony in D” (2017); Emmy- winning “Sunday’s Best” (2010), and “Coconut Grove: A Sense of Place” (2005). The Ford Foundation commissioned Johnson to direct the documentary “Breaking the Silence” (2006), which chronicled the rise of HIV infection in the Black-American South. Johnson served as head of production and senior producer/editor for Plum TV and helped create TeleAmerica Broadcasting Network. His documentary “Deep City: Birth of the Miami Sound” (SXSW 2014) aired nation-wide on PBS. He has a B.S. in communications from University of Miami.
About Jason Panton
Jason Panton is a multi-talented creator, entrepreneur, brand developer, DJ, Grammy-nominated A&R, and restaurateur. Born in Kingston, Jamaica, Panton has leveraged his dynamic understanding of culture and weaved it into unique brands, spaces, and collaborations that have made him a name worthy of mention within contemporary culture of Jamaica and spaces within the African Diaspora.
About Supa Cindy
An Award-winning on-air radio host, media personality, event MC, entrepreneur and philanthropist, Supa Cindy is transforming South Florida through her vibrant energy, infectious personality, deep-rooted core values, and her love of giving back to the community. Known as the “Voice of Miami”, Cindy currently hosts “The Pac Jam Morning Show” every weekday, “Community Matters” every Sunday morning and “99JAMZ Co-Sign” the first Sunday of every month on 99JAMZ (WEDR).
In 2016, Cindy started Cin D. Media, a multi-faceted media company broken down into three divisions—music, TV/film, and digital media. Her 501(c)(3) non-profit organization “Supa Friends” was established in 2003 and works to educate and motivate young people of South Florida.
Supa Cindy was selected as 1 of 30 radio personalities nationwide to be featured in the Library of Congress Black Women in Radio exhibition. She’s part of the Recording Academy’s class of 2022 Grammy member, and she has been named Miami New Times Best Radio Personality, Glitz & Girl Power Award for Philanthropy, Hennessy Privilege Toast Award, and Media Personality of the Year. In 2023, she received the Key to North Miami Beach while hosting her annual Supa Cindy Day.
In 2024, she received a proclamation for Miami Gardens during the annual Jazz in the Gardens festival, and the proclamation for Miami-Dade County from Mayor Daniella Levine Cava while speaking at Miami Dade Community College.
