William Pope. L | Black Factory

William Pope. L
Black Factory
Lewiston, USA: Self-published, 2003
[unpaginated], 14 x 14 cm., staple-bound
Edition size unknown


The Black Factory is a touring performance-installation on wheels, which travels the country in the hopes of initiating conversations about class, race, and difference. The work consists of a library, a workshop, and a gift shop. The book serves as a primer for the project, presenting computer generated images accompanied by short texts describing the ways it functions as a vehicle through which participants confront and dismantle their apathy about racial stereotyping.

“What is the Black Factory? What does it do?…The Black Factory is an industry that runs on our prejudices…We travel this nation’s highways and byways from sea to shining sea, town and country, door to door, bringing the blackness to the places that need it most…We harvest all your confusions, questions and conundrums, and transform them into the greatest gift of all: possibility!

[...]

"Typically the Factory arrives at a city or town and sets up its interactive workshop on the street. People bring objects that represent blackness to them. The Factory’s workers use these objects in tightly rehearsed but loosely performed skits to stimulate a conversation — a flow of ideas, images and experiences. Most objects are photographed and made part of the Factory’s virtual library, some are housed in the Factory’s archive for later use, and some are pulverized in the Factory’s workshop to make new products available in the Factory’s gift shop."

- William Pope. L, introduction

Below: Images of the Black Factory in action, and The Black Factory Archive (2003 - ongoing) from the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in NYC.