David Uzochukwu: Bodies of Water

David Uzochukwu: Bodies of Water is a poetic meditation on identity, migration, and belonging. This exhibition marks the artist’s first solo museum show, introducing audiences to his visionary photographic practice. Drawing on mythology, fantasy, and personal and collective histories, Uzochukwu presents hybrid beings—part human, part animal—who inhabit surreal, dreamlike landscapes. Adorned with fins, scales, and other features, these figures are equipped to thrive in challenging waters. The resulting images evoke the adaptability and resilience of diasporic communities navigating environments often marked by hostility and exclusion. Within these imagined worlds, Blackness resists simple definition: it is fluid, shifting, and vibrantly alive.

The exhibition catalogue is supported by Furthermore: a program of the J.M. Kaplan Fund. The Black Art Collective is presented by Bank of America. First Edition is led by a generous host committee, including Sudhir Agrawal, Gloria and Kenneth Boyland, Chiquilla and Eric Brown, Nelda and Tyrone Burroughs, Trevia Chatman, Donald Comer, Dr. and Mrs. Reginald Coopwood, Sharon Devine Harris and Jeff D. Harris, Kimberly and Elliot Perry, Valerie and Carl Person, Linda Ivy Rosser and Glenn Rosser, Edith Kelly Green Thompson, Belinda Watkins, and Harlem's Fashion Row.

All exhibitions at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art are underwritten by the MBMA Exhibition Fund: Lead support provided by Kay Clark, and Maggie and Milton Lovell, with additional funding from Anonymous, Irene and Ron Ayotte, Gloria and Kenneth Boyland, Deborah and Bob Craddock, Susan and James Edelman, Debi and Galen Havner, Sally Hergenrader, James R. Humphreys, Betty and George Johnson, Kristen and Jay Keegan, Valerie and Carl Person, Deborah D. Tipton, Bill Townsend, and the Doris S. and Hubert Kiersky Charitable Remainder Trust.