November 7, 2025
6 - 7 pm
TILT Main Gallery
Free
TILT Institute for the Contemporary Image presents a conversation between visual artist Shikeith and Peter Barberie, The Brodsky Curator of Photographs and Head of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Join us to learn more about Shikeith’s exhibition, People Who Die Bad Don’t Stay In Ground, which is currently on view at TILT through November 22, 2025. In addition to discussing the exhibition, the pair will also explore other aspects of the artist’s practice and how his work connects with current issues.
Shikeith’s multidisciplinary practice interrogates the sociopolitical structures and histories that oppress the psychological landscapes of marginalized communities. Influenced by his interest in hauntology and spiritual traditions from the African diaspora, Shikeith’s artwork both mines and speculates on methodologies of disentangling and reconciliation. His photographs employ magical realist aesthetics, creating elusive compositions, challenging gender norms, and asking viewers to engage with the invisible forces that shape their perception of the subjects depicted and themselves. Shikeith earned a BA in Integrative Arts from the Pennsylvania State University and a MFA from the Yale School of Art in New Haven, Connecticut. He currently resides and works in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Peter Barberie is The Brodsky Curator of Photographs and Head of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Since 2008 he has organized more than twenty-five exhibitions, including WILD: Michael Nichols (2017), a survey of Nichols’ photography of the natural world creatively installed with art on similar themes from across the Museum’s collection; Paul Strand: Master of Modern Photography (2014), an in-depth retrospective of Strand’s photography and films that traveled to several European venues; and Zoe Strauss: Ten Years (2012), a mid-career survey of Strauss’s photography and her closely related efforts at public engagement. His publications include Looking at Atget (2005); Dreaming in Black and White: Photography at the Julien Levy Gallery (2006); Zoe Strauss: Ten Years (2012); among others.
