Union Hall Denver

To close out The Wild Bloom, Union Hall’s first performance series, we will hear real, vulnerable, and deeply human tales by acclaimed storytellers PT Smith Jr. and Elliott Higgins, multi-time Moth StorySLAM Champions and guests on the Moth Radio Hour (The Moth). A cast of veteran improvisers will then transform the stories into a completely unscripted performance inspired by what they just heard for the very first time. Expect heartfelt moments, sharp comedy, chaos, and the kind of once-only magic that can never happen the same way twice.

Two unforgettable stories will be interpreted by the improv cast of Tory Spelling for one wildly unpredictable night. The cast of Tory Spelling includes: Joanna Brown, Samantha Mitchell, Nick P. Ross, Jami Baker, Connor Schuck, Max Schwartz, and special guest improvisers.

🎟️ $17.50 tickets includes food, beer, and fun! https://events.humanitix.com/wild-bloom/

Thanks to our sponsors and partners, Meow Wolf Denver, Holland & Hart, Ratio Beerworks, and Whole Foods Market for supporting this series, and to all of YOU, who have showed up for Denver creatives these past few weeks! ✨🌸✨

We worm raved, we flowed as trees, we channeled our inner frog, and welcomed a season of abundance and renewal. 🪱🐸🌼🌱 Thank you to Courtney Osaka-Durgin and friends of the Japanese Arts Network for producing a memorable evening of silliness and play!

Work rave installation by Elizabeth Kirchmeier
Spoken word by James Brunt
Soothing guitar by Matthew Ozaki-Durgin
Taiko drumming by Courtney Ozaki-Durgin
Voice/dance performance and tree improv by Gwendolyn Gussman

The Wild Bloom: Spring Performance Series continues at Union Hall for one more night of fun this Saturday, May 30th! Don’t miss it.

Sound System culture emerged as a means of survival and celebration during post-war, pre-independence Kingston, Jamaica. Exhibiting artist Darrien Williamson, builder of Dem Deya Sound System, continues this tradition. From constructing speakers to producing music, Williamson brings people together through audio parties and by expanding into design, furniture, and sculptural objects with Asé Continuum, a practice rooted in the Yoruba concept of asé, the spiritual power to create.

Within the exhibition Drexciya: Into the Deep, curated by Sierra Jeter, one of Williamson’s fully-functional, custom-designed, hand-built sound systems pays homage to the tools and genres that had a heavy influence in 20th-century Black musical expression. The base of the Williamson’s sounsystem is inspired by designs from the 80’s, and the horns on top are inspired by designs from the 30’s. The setup within this exhibition is just half of the original design, yet Williamson, who goes by the DJ name Scarien, was able to blow away audiences with a live performance during the opening reception in March and an intimate vinyl session in April.

provided technical and visual support for this installation at Union Hall, bringing in movement and contextual storytelling to the Drexciyan mythology from which this exhibition is derived.

There’s only one more day to witness the designs of Dem Deya sound systems! Afterward, follow along for future music events.

📸 Photos by Helen Yoseph and Raymundo Muñoz

Drawing from the speculative mythology of Drexciya, a subaqueous civilization imagined as descendants of Africans lost during the Middle Passage, Ehime Ora’s practice reframes the ocean as a living archive by intertwining the rhythms of the written/spoken word, photography, and sculpture. Ora, a Brooklyn-based writer, artist, and priestess of the Ifá & Orisa tradition, is the author of Spirits Come from Water: An Introduction to Ancestral Veneration and Reclaiming African Spiritual Practices. This is one of the many books available for interactive reading in Union Hall’s current exhibition, Drexciya: Into the Deep, curated by Sierra Jeter.

“In the world of Drexciya, Ora’s contributions extend beyond text, through photography, a cosmogram installation and an interactive archive and literary library, she creates visual spaces where water, spirit, and ancestral memory intersect. Her work allows visitors to experience the ocean as a living archive, connecting the rhythms of life above and below the waves–inviting reflection and healing.” — Sierra Jeter

The final day to experience Drexciya: Into the Deep with artwork by Ehime Ora, Darrien Williamson, Kimber Greenwod, Johnny Draco, and Yazz Atmore is May 2.

Kimber Greenwood is a Florida-based photographer and certified freediver who specializes in underwater portraiture. The three photographs present in Union Hall’s current exhibition, Drexciya: Into the Deep, bring the depth of the Drexciya mythology to life by embodying its ethos of survival transformed into resilience, liberation, and beauty.

Greenwood centers Black women suspended between air and water, past and future. Her work evokes beauty and rebirth, and reflects the power of the feminine form as a divine vessel of life and death. In Greenwood’s photographs, the ocean and the divine feminine becomes the sacred portal that brings new life into being.

Visit Drexciya: Into the Deep, curated by Sierra Jeter at Union Hall Art Space, now extended through May 2. Gallery hours are Wednesday through Saturday, 12-6pm.

Victorious, 2024
Underwater Photography on Acrylic
24 x 36 inches
$490

Fins & Wings, 2023
Underwater Photography on Acrylic
24 x 36 inches
$590

Held in Water, 2025
Underwater Photography on Acrylic
24 x 36 inches
$590

In Drexciya: Into the Deep, Yazz Atmore presents “Women We Call Home,” a series of floral collage installations and digital works that center Black women and ancestral presence through altar-like compositions that function as sites of remembrance.

Rooted in a collage and interview-based process, the series gathers stories and reflections that honor the Black women who shape our understanding of home—mothers, grandmothers, aunts, and chosen family. Inspired in part by Atmore’s late grandmother, these works translate lived memory into visual form, using photographs, magazine fragments, color, and pattern to evoke the layered, expansive presence of those remembered and revered.

In dialogue with the Drexciyan mythos, which reimagines life and survival beyond the violence of the Middle Passage, “Women We Call Home” positions these women as both origin and future: ancestors, living memory, and the foundation for generations to come. The series reflects the exhibition’s framing of the Atlantic ocean as both portal and memorial.

Visit the gallery or unionhalldenver.org/rough-gems-drexciya to read the interviews.

📸 Raymundo Muñoz

Johnny Draco’s “Current Crowns,” (2026) emerges from the depths of afrofuturist mythology where memory, philosophy, and myth coverage. Created in dialogue with Drexciya: Into the Deep, curated by Sierra Jeter, the work challenges dominant narratives around representation, using details like traditional hairstyles to disrupt norms and invite closer looking.

Through bold color, striking silhouettes, and symbolic detail, Draco built a character who belongs to a subaqueous realm. Inspired by the Drexciya mythos, the painting reflects a reimagining of survival beyond the trauma of the Middle Passage, offering a vision rooted in liberation and possibility.

“When I was originally making Current Crowns, I didn’t know where the piece was going to land. It aligned when I met Sierra and she was telling me that she was making this show, Drexciya. I was already building a character that could live in an underwater world.”

Current Crowns, 2026
Oil and Acrylic on Canvas, 24x24 inches
Available for $360.00

Exhibition sneak-peak of Drexciya: Into the Deep, curated by Sierra Jeter. Expect an ethereal and energizing playlist to accompany your visit to this underwater memorial brought to life by artwork from the minds of Darrien Williamson, Ehime Ora, Johnny Draco, Kimber Greenwood, and Yazz Atmore.

Gallery hours are Wednesday through Saturday, 12-6pm!

These are the final few days to visit the Union Hall’s first family exhibition, Biyáál. Don’t miss the chance to witness weeks of labor dedicated to creating two large-scale Navajo sandpaintings by JayCee Beyale alongside sculptures by Randall Beyale, paintings by Wayne Beyale, and so much more.

Gallery hours are Wednesday to Saturday, 12-6pm. The final day to visit Biyáál is January 31.