Antonio Duke is a Twin Cities based actor and playwright. He strives to be an unrestricted conduit for the spirits he conjures in his theatrical practice. For him performance is an act of spiritual manifestation rooted in an ancient practice of Afrocentric storytelling. He follows in the tradition of the griot, West African oral storytellers who are blessed with the task of being the keepers of their community’s histories.
He approaches his work with the ambition of being an excavator of ghosts. His goal is to use his mind, body, and voice, as tools, to harvest the rich soil of his cultural heritage. When performing he seeks to be a linguistic archaeologist. He’s compelled to relish in the oratorical bones of his ancestors so they can live again within a space for a moment of remembrance. The manifestation of this epic expression is electric. It is this electricity that compels him back to the stage.
In his work he focuses on mythology. Within mythos lies intimate and epic circumstances that he’s driven to explore. He conjures most of his muse form black spiritualities; specifically those deities from the Yoruba, Santeria and Voodoo traditions. His artistic mission is to provide conjuration spells for black folk. By offering black magic he hopes to illuminate a communal healing space. He is an alumnus of the University of Minnesota/Guthrie B.F.A Actor Training Program. He has been seen on stages with The Blue Barn Theatre, Penumbra Theatre, Pillsbury House + Theatre, Climb Theatre, Nebraska Shakespeare Festival, Pangea World Theatre and The Guthrie Theatre. He has three solo performance pieces. His first solo performance piece Tears of Moons was accepted into The Guthrie Theatre’s Solo Emerging Artist Celebration. His second solo performance piece Ashes of Moons premiered at Pillsbury House Theatre’s as a part of their Naked Stages Fellowship. He received an Artist Initiative Grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board and was an inaugural recipient of the Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship for his third solo piece Missing Mississippi Moons. He is the Co-Artistic Director of The Black Ensemble Players. You can expect him to cultivate many more stages as his journey continues to grow.
"Creating 'Deon' gave me the opportunity to express my own grief. The great gift of being an artist is that if you’re going through a dark time you can reveal it through your work which can provide a catharsis. 'Deon' shows a poet remembering bearing witness to a moment of trauma in his community. I’m grateful to Red Eye Theater for providing me space where I could illuminate some of the dark."-Antonio Duke