GanttFest drew more than 1,500 people to the uptown cultural center on Saturday. The event celebrated the center’s cultural contribution to the community with poetry, art and music. The free daytime event drew a mix of families, but the evening party “Something Like Fahamenon” was a 90s-themed adult party. It drew a mix of local celebrities, visiting author Sonia Sanchez and local hip-hop heads.
The event celebrated the arrival of Fahamu Pecou who is a McColl Center For Visual Arts and the Harvey Gantt Center for African-American Art + Culture. The Fahamenon party launched a series of events surrounding the Atlanta-based Pecou’s Charlotte residency The next event is Passage of Right: Call & Response: A Series of Candid Conversations Around Black Manhood. Panelists joining Pecou are Mark Anthony Neal, professor of African & American Studies at Duke University; Ed Garnes, founder of From Afros to Shelltoes, McColl Center artist-in-residence alumni Susan Harbage Page and poet/actor John W. Love, Jr.
