Abrons’ 2019-2020 Visual Artist AIRspace residents Elliott Jerome Brown Jr., Arisleyda Dilone, Alicia Mersy, and Charisse Pearlina Weston kick off an interactive exhibition presenting work developed during their residency period Saturday, October 3, 1-3 PM ET at the Abrons Amphitheater. DJ Ted Kamal is set up to accompany the opening activities at the amphitheater, where you can pick up a map for the self-guided tour of the exhibition.
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Elliott Jerome Brown Jr.’s photography will be presented outdoors on the exterior of Abrons Arts Center in partnership with the Photoville Festival 2020. His photographic works visualize moments of contemplation, self-possession, and intimacy. The ambiguous nature of the photographs is in favor of an expansive, incoherent, and timeless regard for what is pictured. Similar to how experiences are layered in memory, he considers how a singular moment may be recontextualized to glean something comprehensive, new, or unplanned for.
On October 3rd at 7 PM ET, Arisleyda Dilone presents a work-in-progress excerpt from their forthcoming feature-length documentary, Y Este Cuerpo También/This Body, Too, which chronicles the filmmaker’s journey as a queer intersex woman in a clan of Dominican-American women. The film considers the literal construction of womanhood and femininity within their own family in an effort to make space for complexity, collective healing, and personal growth. The screening will be followed by a discussion between Dilone and film curator Dessane Lopez Cassell. RSVP.
Alicia Mersy presents photographs from her project NURSES on the windows of Henry Street Settlement Workforce Development Center at 178 Broome Street. NURSES is a documentary project about the daily lives of New York City nurses. By presenting these stories and images, NURSES gives homage to those who choose a career in care and aims to remind us of the universal importance of empathy and compassion in healing.
In Abrons Arts Center’s Main Gallery, Charisse Pearlina Weston presents her new series of work, nine physical poems, which incorporates colored glass into investigations of “the fold” as a spatial realm for/of Blackness. nine physical poems will be on-view from Monday – Friday, 10 AM – 5 PM.
AIRspace Residents receive a monetary award for their participation in the program, as well as a private studio space for nine months at the Abrons’ facility, located on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Throughout this residency cycle, remote studio visits are arranged with critics, curators, artists, and other arts-workers. The residency period culminates in a group exhibition.
