How Harlem and London Creatives Are Reclaiming the Archive
By Zuri Blake
Meet Joy Bivins of Harlem and Ekow Eshun of London — two cultural leaders protecting the Black past to power our future.
History isn’t neutral.
It’s curated, controlled, and often erased.
But from Harlem to London, Black curators are reclaiming the archive — and retooling it for liberation.
At the helm of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem is Joy Bivins, a visionary whose career has centered around one mission: make the Black archive accessible and alive. Formerly a curator at the New York Historical Society and the Chicago History Museum, Bivins now leads one of the world’s most important collections of African diaspora knowledge.
“Our stories are not marginal,” she says. “They are central. And the archive must reflect that.”
Across the Atlantic, Ekow Eshun — former Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London — is shaping cultural memory through public exhibitions, film, and critical writing. His landmark curation of In the Black Fantastic at London’s Hayward Gallery redefined how Afrofuturism and myth shape Black imagination.
“I wanted to explore how fantasy is a means of resistance,” Eshun said. “A way to claim agency over the narrative.”
Both Bivins and Eshun are not just stewards of the past — they are architects of memory.
Where Bivins brings Black archival material into the digital age and public classrooms, Eshun creates immersive spaces that invite new mythologies, spiritual awakenings, and futuristic aesthetics.
One protects the documents. The other extends the dream.
Their work reminds us that archiving is not just academic. It’s sacred. It’s how we remember who we are, so we never forget how far we’ve come.
In Harlem and London — two global Black capitals with deep colonial shadows — these leaders are lighting the way.
They aren’t just preserving history.
They’re defending Black reality.
And making sure the next generation can find themselves in the story.
