KUUMBA 365
In partnership with Harbourfront Centre, The Power Plant presents KUUMBA 365, a year-long initiative celebrating Black cultures and creative practices.
About KUUMBA 365
In partnership with Harbourfront Centre, The Power Plant presents KUUMBA 365, a year-long initiative celebrating Black cultures and creative practices. Each February, the program invites three artists to explore and develop new work through a Black cultural lens, with commissions centred on literary, spoken word, dance, music, theatre arts, and more.
Committed to investing in Black futures, KUUMBA 365 supports the transformative work and achievements of Afro-Canadian artists—today, tomorrow, and always—while fostering ongoing engagement with Black artistic expression throughout the year.
2026: Music
Responding to this season’s exhibitions by Jeneen Frei Njootli and Christina Leslie, musicians Dennis Passley, Larnell Lewis, and Dwight Jones present original compositions as part of KUUMBA 365, a celebration of Black culture through sound. Presented by The Power Plant in partnership with Harbourfront Centre, the program culminates in a collective performance that brings music and contemporary art into conversation.
2025: Dance
The second edition of KUUMBA 365 featured four dancers — Esie Mensah, Lua Shayenne, Katlyn Addison, and Syreeta Hector — who responded to Charles Campbell’s How many colours has the sea and Lap-See Lam’s Floating Sea Palace at The Power Plant. Through movement and performance, they created dynamic interpretations of the exhibitions, offering compelling and inventive perspectives that brought the visual artworks into dialogue with dance. Their work highlighted the power of embodied storytelling and the richness of Black creative practices within the KUUMBA 365 program.
2024: Spoken Word
Three artists respond to The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery’s Fall 2023 Exhibitions in a series of performances and videos for the inaugural edition of KUUMBA 365. Artists Randell Adjei, Dwayne Morgan and Paulina O’Kieffe-Anthony chose one or more works to respond to through the Black cultural lens using spoken word. Their creative process was documented through diary entries and personal interviews.
