Dawta
Jessica Ashman’s Dawta is a story of escaping the past through the imagining of an unknown future, an unknown hope.
A film by Jessica Ashman, produced by Animate Projects, and supported by the National Lottery through Arts Council England.
Dawta was first performed live at the Midlands Arts Centre for Flatpack Festival 2021, then at Cafe OTO in London in February 2022.
“I have the same power as you. Let my power guide you forward.”
Dawta tells the story of a young Black woman, running away from a pivotal moment in her family history. Guided by two elders, she discovers a safe, future utopian planet for Black women through a mysterious superpower. Inspired by the artist Jessica Ashman’s own family history of migration and trans-racial fostering, Dawta explores the idea of inherited cycles of trauma within Black women and asks the question: can the energy this trauma brings be harnessed? Can this power be used to discover new dimensions of hope and a future that pushes past the colonial and imperial histories intertwined in Black consciousness?
Inspired by the work of seminal Black science fiction author, Octavia Butler (in particular, her time travelling odyssey, ’Kindred’), Dawta combines experimental animation techniques and live musical performance to create a sci-fi narrative of inter-dimensional time travel, questioning the possibilities of imagining better futures for the Black diaspora.
Jessica Ashman is a multidisciplinary artist working in moving image, music, performance and installation. Her work focuses on creating experimental animated narratives that explore gender, identity and race, drawing on the wider stories of the Black British diaspora communities she was raised in, especially the histories and oral testimonies that have been lost or hidden in these communities.
Ashman’s work has been supported by Animate Projects, Jerwood Visual Arts, Arts Council England, UK Film Council and Channel 4’s Random Acts. She is a BAFTA Scotland award winning animator (2011) and was nominated for an Arts Foundation Futures Awards for Experimental Short Animation (2020).
Ashman also teaches her practice with workshops that explore cultural identity, belonging and histories of oppression, having worked with the Tate, ICA and Wellcome Trust. She has an MA in Animation from the Royal College of Art and is an associate lecturer in Animation at Goldsmiths.
