On the exterior of Essex Market at the corner of Norfolk and Broome streets, is a re-presentation of I Pledge. Presented here as a vinyl installation, I Pledge was created by Amy Khoshbin, House of Trees, and Naomi Shihab Nye in response to mounting xenophobia and gender-based violence for the one-year anniversary of the 2017 Women’s March. I Pledge continues to advocate for a public covenant of respect for all. The collaborators offer a poetic pledge to fight for inclusive, empathetic, humane, and intersectional change.
This project is presented for the two-venue exhibition Textures of Feminist Perseverance, organized by Cuchifritos Gallery + Project Space and The James Gallery. The exhibition asks how women’s daily experiences and contributions are recorded in the public spheres of our physical, virtual, and social lives.
The exhibition continues at The James Gallery in midtown Manhattan, centering the work of 17 female-identifying artists, who imagine ways for women to take up the space they are already producing. What might a city honoring women’s lived experiences look like? How can the city be a living archive of women’s accomplishments in a visual vocabulary that may not already be recognized in the dominant discourse? This work is often achieved through a preoccupation with hands-on and labor-intensive making practices that foreground physical and embodied attentiveness to materials, social gathering, and awareness of time.
Textures of Feminist Perseverance is conceived by artist Dina Weiss and curator Katherine Carl, Ph.D. (James Gallery Institute for Art, Inquiry & Collaborative Practice, CUNY Graduate Center) and presented in partnership with Jodi Waynberg, Executive Director of Artists Alliance Inc and Director of Cuchifritos Gallery + Project Space.
