"Jaleesa Johnston's work explores the ruptured and queer existence of the black female body as both subject and object through performance, video, photography, sculpture, collage, and drawing.  Creating and contesting historical and social truths, mythologies, and narratives, she uses bodies, places, spaces, objects, sounds and movement together in ways that harness their symbolism and embrace the complexities and vulnerabilities of human experiences. Working with her body as material, Jaleesa uses its malleability and symbolism to conjure new narratives that suggest blackness as a liminal site for personal and communal transformation.  Jaleesa is particularly concerned with articulating gestures of the body as a fragmented language that can be used to voice narratives of fugitivity, resistance and freedom." (Promo Copy)