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‘Black Space Matters’ Exhibit Transforms Asphalt Lot into Garden

VCU CNS | October 12, 2020

Topics: Duron Chavis, food insecurity, Institute For Contemporary Art, Institute for Contemporary art VCU, Quilian Riano, resiliency gardens, Silly Genius, Stephanie Smith, VCU Institute of Contemporary Art

The “Commonwealth” exhibit at VCU’s Institute for Contemporary Art features work from 10 artists, including an outdoor garden installation by local activist Duron Chavis — which looks pretty amazing from an overhead view.

A local activist transformed a vacant lot outside the Institute for Contemporary Art in Richmond to highlight issues of food security and the importance of Black and brown community spaces.

The “Commonwealth” exhibit at Virginia Commonwealth University’s ICA features work from 10 artists including an outdoor installation created by activist and community farmer Duron Chavis, who builds gardens throughout Richmond. The full exhibit seeks to examine how common resources influence the wealth and well-being of communities.

Chavis proposed the resiliency garden exhibit in 2019, during a public forum at the ICA. The resiliency garden — food grown to weather the tough times and to have food independence — is installed in an asphalt lot at Grace and Belvidere streets next to the ICA, and features 30 raised beds of fruits, vegetables, and flowers.

Concept drawing for Duron Chavis’ Resiliency Garden, 2020 design by Quilian Riano of DSGN AGNC.

An extension of the garden exhibit is the “Black Space Matters” mural by Southside artist Silly Genius. A wall in the lot is painted, with fruit making the word Black; beneath the garden in big, yellow letters is the phrase “Space Matters.” The garden beds have historic quotes from civil rights leaders Kwame Ture and Malcolm X, among other activists. 

“Black Space Matters means that Black people need space,” Chavis said. “We need space that is explicitly designed, planned, and implemented by Black and brown people.”

Chavis, along with a crew of volunteers, started building the garden on Aug. 10, while the ICA temporarily closed to install other exhibits.

“We invited him to think with us about how to activate a vacant lot next to the ICA,” said Stephanie Smith, ICA chief curator. “You could think about what it means to take a space and institutional resources, then give them over to an activist.”

Chavis seeks to address lack of food access through his activism. Food insecurity, defined by the United States Department of Agriculture as “a household-level economic and social condition of limited or uncertain access to adequate food,” is an issue in Richmond’s low-income neighborhoods. The city had over 35,000 food-insecure people in 2018, according to Feeding America, a network of more than 200 food banks.

“In a conversation about food justice, Black people are predominately impacted by lack of food access,” Chavis said. “We need space to address that issue.”

Low income communities need access to resources and necessary skills to solve food wealth issues on their own, he said. 

“We do not need anybody to come into our community to drop off food,” Chavis said. 

He’s been doing work like this since 2012 and doesn’t have a hard count of how many garden beds have been built. 

“Dozens, oh god, it’s all across the city,” he said. 

Chavis amplified his efforts this year because of the pandemic. He fundraised and received a grant, according to a VPM report, to build over 200 resiliency gardens with the help of volunteers. 

The “Commonwealth” exhibit features work from 10 artists including an outdoor installation created by community farmer, Duron Chavis, who builds gardens throughout Richmond. The resiliency garden is installed in an asphalt lot next to the Institute for Contemporary Art and features 30 raised beds of fruits, vegetables and flowers. Photo by VCU CNS.

Quilian Riano, an architect at New York studio DSGN AGNC, designed the concept drawing for the ICA garden, which was envisioned as a public space for conversation and lecture. The completed garden is nearly identical to the original design, except with an added texture and dimension, Riano said.

 The “Commonwealth” exhibit will be open until Jan. 17, 2021. After the exhibit ends, the gardens’ supplies and plants will be redistributed to other resiliency garden project locations throughout Richmond. Chavis collaborates with other groups and people to help people grow their own food during the pandemic.

Tickets to the indoor exhibitions can be reserved on the ICA website. Exhibits include a video performance by indigenous artist Tanya Lukin Linklater, Carolina Caycedo’s “Distressed Debt” and a sculpture by Lukin Linklater and Tiffany Shaw-Collinge.

Written by India Espy-Jones, Capital News Service. Top Photo by VCU CNS.

Get Culture, Not COVID

Laura Drummond | September 9, 2020

Topics: Institute for Contemporary art VCU, Richmond galleries, Richmond museums, Science Museum Of Virginia, The Valentine, VCU ICA, Virginia Museum Of History & Culture

Looking to get out of the house without getting sick? Skip the bars and head to the museums for a safer change of scenery.

Museums around Richmond are starting to reopen with new, advanced safety protocols. As cultural landmarks, these spaces provide opportunities for education, community engagement, and enrichment. There are a number of new and ongoing exhibitions, each offering a safe way for the whole family to have fun while experiencing something out of the ordinary. Museums add to the vibrancy of the city, and their reopening brings hope in the face of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. 

The museums in the area have implemented face mask requirements, capacity reductions to allow for social distancing, hand sanitizer stations, alterations to hands-on exhibits, and expanded cleaning requirements. Before your visit, be sure to check the individual museum’s website for reopening policies, up-to-date operating hours, and other admission information. 

Photo: Arizona Science Center, via Science Museum of Virginia

Science Museum of Virginia
2500 West Broad Street
Richmond, VA 23220
Open daily from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. 
www.smv.org

The Science Museum of Virginia reopened its doors to the public on September 5. Now through November 1, visitors of all ages can explore the Giant Insects exhibition, which includes six robotic insects ranging from 11 to 22 feet tall — 40 to 120 times larger than their actual size. Insects from around the world are on display in large-scale, robotic form so that viewers can get an up-close view of how the real insects — the Atlas beetle, jungle nymph stick insect, caterpillar, desert locust, and praying mantis — behave in the wild. 

Access to the Giant Insects exhibition is included in the cost of museum admission. 

Photo: Alicia Díaz

Institute for Contemporary Art 
Virginia Commonwealth University
601 West Broad Street
Richmond, VA 23220
Open Friday—Sunday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. 
icavcu.org

On September 12, the Institute for Contemporary Art at Virginia Commonwealth University will reopen its galleries and present Commonwealth, a new indoor/outdoor exhibition. Commonwealth “explores how our common resources are used to influence the wealth and well-being of our communities,” according to the ICA.

This exhibition is the result of a years-long collaboration between the ICA and two other organizations, Philadelphia Contemporary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Beta-Local in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Exploring the concept of “commonwealth” in these three locations through writing, image-making, performance, gardening, and other forms of cultural expression, the exhibition “offers paths to understanding both the unequal structures that shape our lived realities and ways that people might come together to make the world more equitable,” according to the ICA. It features the work of artists Firelei Báez, Carolina Caycedo, Duron Chavis, Alicia Díaz, Sharon Hayes, Tanya Lukin Linklater, Nelson Rivera, Monica Rodriguez, and The Conciliation Project (TCP). 

Timed tickets are free and should be reserved in advance. 

Photo by Jonah Schuhart

The Valentine
1015 East Clay Street 
Richmond, VA 23219
Open Tuesday—Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. 
thevalentine.org

Explore Richmond’s complicated and nuanced history through one of the current exhibitions at the Valentine. Its most recent exhibition, Ain’t Misbehavin’: 1920s Richmond, displays costumes, textiles, art, and artifacts from the Nathalie L. Klaus and Reynolds Family Galleries. Come for the 1920s fashion, stay for the look at the many ways in which Richmonders experienced that pivotal decade. 

Voices from Richmond’s Hidden Epidemic features oral histories of HIV/AIDS crisis survivors, caregivers, activists, and healthcare workers, collected by Laura Browder and Patricia Herrera. Compelling photographic portraits by Michael Simon accompany the stories. 

On view through November 8, #BallotBattle: Richmond’s Social Struggle for Suffrage imagines how Richmonders advocating for and against suffrage might have used social media to further their positions if Twitter and Facebook had been around 100 years ago. As this year marks the centennial of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, this exhibition provides a timely and accessible lens for viewing the struggle of suffrage. 

Free timed tickets must be reserved in advance. While the Wickham House and the Edward V. Valentine Sculpture Studio remain closed until further notice, the Valentine Garden, an historic greenspace, is open for visits before or after a self-guided gallery tour. 

In addition to seeing Richmond’s history on display at the Valentine, you can also have a participatory role. The Valentine has partnered with the Community Foundation for a greater Richmond for the 16th Richmond History Markers and Community Update. Now through October 28, you can nominate trailblazing individuals and organizations who are doing one of the following: creating quality educational opportunities, demonstrating innovative economic solutions, improving regional transportation, championing social justice, promoting community health, and advancing our quality of life. 

Virginia Museum of History and Culture
428 North Arthur Ashe Boulevard
Richmond, VA 23220
Open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.  
www.virginiahistory.org

The Virginia Museum of History and Culture is currently open for in-person visits, but it continues to offer experiences outside of its walls as well. Agents of Change: Female Activism in Virginia from Women’s Suffrage to Today is one current exhibition offering opportunities to enrich understanding in different formats. Like #BallotBattle at the Valentine, this exhibition honors the 100-year anniversary of the passage of the 19thAmendment. The in-person exhibition features artifacts of social and political activism, “highlighting the efforts and impact of a selection of female change-makers,” according to the VMHC. An online version of this exhibition is also available through September 27.

In addition, visitors can take a self-guided driving tour of locations around Richmond that were significant to the suffrage movement in Virginia, thanks to the League of Women Voters – Richmond Metro Area tour map. Furthermore, These Things Can Be Done is a documentary available on YouTube about suffrage in Virginia, featuring archival footage, photographs, oral histories, radio broadcasts, and interviews with historians, descendants of suffragists, and modern activists. 

The VMHC also has an outdoor exhibition at its front entrance. All In Together is a collaborative mural project with Virginia artists Hamilton Glass and Matt Lively. While physical distance remains important for the health and safety of the community, this exhibition allowed for Richmonders to connect from afar. Participants submitted completed coloring pages, and Glass and Lively assembled them to create murals at the VMHC and around the city. 

Timed tickets for indoor exhibitions must be purchased in advance. Admission includes access to all museum exhibitions. 

Photo via Children’s Museum of Richmond/Facebook

Children’s Museum of Richmond
2626 West Broad Street
Richmond, VA 23220
6629 Lake Harbour Drive
Midlothian, VA 23112
Open Thursday—Sunday; check website for hours. 
www.childrensmuseumofrichmond.org

The Children’s Museum of Richmond will reopen to the public on September 17 at both its Downtown and Chesterfield locations. For children through age 8, the Children’s Museum provides a wonderful opportunity to learn and play while getting a change of scenery. Families with video conferencing fatigue can get a break from screen time with all sorts of active and creative play options.

Kids can sharpen their observation skills with a new outdoor iSpy activity at the Downtown location or scale a new 18-foot tire climber at the Chesterfield location. They can also revisit old favorite activities at both locations, like making art in the Art Studio; practicing with coins, bills, and checks at the Bank; and repairing a car at the Service Station.

The Children’s Museum has created clearly marked paths for families to follow while inside in order to maintain social distancing, and has implemented new cleaning procedures. Some exhibits are temporarily closed. Visitors must reserve timed tickets online in advance.

Top Photo: Arizona Science Center, via Science Museum of Virginia

Gone But Not Forgotten: A Sisterhood That Lives Forever

Christopher Brown | September 26, 2019

Topics: art, black art, black poets, ICA, Institute for Contemporary art VCU, maya angelou, nikki giovanni, poetry, The Bluest Eye, the pieces i am, toni morrison, vcu

After Toni Morrison’s passing, her close friend and poet Nikki Giovanni reflected on their story at the Institute of Contemporary Art at VCU.

Picture this: the year is 1970, and author Toni Morrison just published her first book, The Bluest Eye. The book is gaining nationwide attention from critics and readers alike. One reader in particular is fascinated by the novel, especially due to the deep level of storytelling — particularly impressive in Morrison’s first published book. That reader wanted to meet Morrison in person and get to know her on a personal level… so she “stalked” her.

As it happens, that reader was renowned poet Nikki Giovanni. Both she and Morrison happened to live in New York City at the time. Giovanni found out where Morrison’s office was, walked from her apartment on 92nd Street to the office on 52nd Street location, stood outside, and waited for Morrison.

“One thing about me, I can wait for forever,” Giovanni said of her story waiting for Morrison. The two eventually met that day, and thus began a sisterhood that transcends life itself.

Even now, in 2019, Giovanni still talks fondly of that day. Despite age and medical issues affecting her mind, her memories of her friend remain unfazed.

Photo by Christopher Brown

On Wednesday, September 11th, VCU’s Institute of Contemporary Art hosted a screening of the documentary Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am. It was at this event where Giovanni told the story of her first meeting with Morrison, who passed away in August at the age of 88. The post-screening discussion with Giovanni focused on her lifelong friendship with Morrison, and the way they inspired each other during difficult times.

“When [my mother] died, I called Toni… I’m sad and I needed some advice,” Giovanni recalled. “[I asked her] ‘What should I do?’ and she said, ‘Write.’ I wrote a poem for Toni.”

A mixture of happiness and sadness filled Giovanni’s voice when she shared memories of herself and Morrison. The audience was made up of strangers to their world, but nonetheless felt the waves of emotions as they filled the room. One memory took Giovanni back to 2012, when she, Morrison, and Maya Angelou, among others, were hosted by Virginia Tech as they paid tribute to the author after she lost her son two years prior.

“What I wanted was that we give back something to Toni,” Giovanni said of the event. “What we wanted was, ‘Could you come and read your favorite Toni Morrison?’”

Photo by Christopher Brown

The event was magical but bittersweet for the sisterhood of writers, as Angelou would pass two years later — and eventually the honoree, Toni Morrison, passed on as well. 

“What she said that struck us all,” Giovanni said, “was, ‘If nothing else ever happens for me in my public life, this does it for me.’ It brought tears to my eyes.”

Giovanni’s love for her “sister” is a prime example of the effect that Toni Morrison had on her friends, family, and fans, both in her writing and her presence. In The Pieces I Am, activists and writers like Sonia Sanchez and Angela Davis got emotional when discussing the magnitude of Morrison’s legacy.

Now in her late 70s, Giovanni has survived two battles with cancer and a stroke, and yet, she is one of the few writers of this powerful black sisterhood that’s still alive. Moments like this event at the ICA, or the 2012 tribute at Virginia Tech, are rare treats, giving the public a glimpse of how special and important this sisterhood was and is — to Giovanni, to Morrison, and to many others.

ICA cinema hosts films every second Wednesday at 7 p.m and is free and open to the public.

Top Photo by Christopher Brown

INK at ICA: VCU’s Culture Mag Celebrates Latest Issue

Aviance Hawkes | April 15, 2019

Topics: DJ Boygirl, ICA, INK Magazine, Institute for Contemporary art VCU, release party, student publications, VCU’s Institute for Contemporary Art (ICA)

Celebrating their new issue with silkscreens and face paint, VCU’s INK Magazine took over the ICA for First Friday.

INK Magazine celebrated the release of their new publication, INK Magazine Volume 11: The Camp Issue, at The Institute of Contemporary Art as part of ICA’s First Friday celebrations on Friday, April 5.

The completely free event included a free copy of the magazine, face painting, photobooths, an INK tote, and live music from DJ Boygirl (full disclosure: that’s me). The museum was filled with a combination of local artists, students, and members of the community who had an interest in VCU’s student-run arts and culture magazine.


INK Magazine releases a print issue every Spring; the student staffers work hard throughout the school year on every aspect of the issue, from design and photography to writing and creative direction. It’s a huge relief to get the issue to the printer, and by the time of the release party, everyone was ready to cut loose and celebrate.

As the DJ for the evening, I wanted to fill the room with upbeat and acoustic sounds. My picks worked out: artists like Solange, Pharrell, The Internet, and Kali Uchis really had the room moving. Considering that it was my first time DJing at a museum, I was feeling the pressure beforehand. Thankfully, it turned out to be the most comfortable and entertaining event I’ve ever done. What’s more, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, and the music.

But enough about me! A lot of other attractions graced the event as well. The free INK tote bags were being decorated with a silkscreen right there in the ICA, and attendees got to watch the silkscreening process happen live. A helpful sign next to the rack of finished totes read “Pick up your tote here (Please allow 15 minutes drying time).”

There was a photobooth that included numerous props, including shimmery bags and cowboy hats, for people to come and take pictures with. Attendees got creative, showing personality and having some laughs as they snapped a few pics. Face painting was a fun element of the event as well, and there was almost universal participation; designs ranged from cherry tops to eyeballs and from smiley faces to crying eyes.

At the end of the party, everyone headed home clutching brand-new copies of INK Magazine Volume 11: The Camp Issue. If you didn’t get one of your own, never fear: it will soon be uploaded to the magazine’s website. Keep up with what INK has going on at inkmagazinevcu.com, and at their instagram, @ink_magazine.

Photos by Raelyn Fines

‘Dirtscraper’: Diving Into the ICA’s Virtual Reality Exhibit

Ash Griffith | May 21, 2018

Topics: AI, art, Dirtscraper, ICA, Institute for Contemporary art VCU, RVA ARt, virtual reality

Upon opening, VCU’s new Institute for Contemporary Art opened gave visitors several inspiring and thought-provoking exhibits such as Betty Tompkins’ paintings “WOMEN Words”, and Paul Rucker’s “Storm in the Time of Shelter”, featuring life-sized figures wearing the regalia of the Ku Klux Klan, but instead of  white robes the figures were wearing silk Ghanaian Kente cloth. Along with that, the ICA introduced “Dirtscraper” a virtual reality game created by Brooklyn-based digital media artist Peter Burr and Oakland based video-game designer Porpentine.

The game takes the audience through various levels of the world including industry, and commerce, as you are led through a post-apocalyptic style world with protagonist, Aria, a janitor and caretaker working within the labyrinth. Having a love for dystopian-esque virtual reality games I decided to venture in and dive into this strange world.

Projected onto the walls of a small, black room, “Dirtscraper” looks to be just a very detailed experimental film in the aesthetic of Commodore 64. However, through the help of a small podium in the back center of the room, it allows the audience to control certain levels and aspects of the game as far as how far up or down, or left or right each level can go. Certain story mode screens add various important points of narration and dialogue to keep the story moving forward.

The work simulates an underground structure whose inhabitants move through spaces shaped by economies and class hierarchies — from mining zones to areas blazing with advertisements to luxury terraces adorned with sculpture.

“[Dirtscraper] is really speaking about the ways [us as a] society use gaming as an extension for the ways that we take control and power over societies through different mechanisms [such as] commerce, city planning,” said ICA Curator Amber Esseiva. “Visitors are allowed to navigate through this world going all the way from subterranean to the top of the narrative, but they don’t actually have control.”

Art, even as far back as we can remember, has always had an underlying responsibility to make its audience think and challenge their ideas. Given the current political and social climates, while they did not directly influence, the piece did encourage it.

Essevia said these are topics that both Burr and Porpentine were heavily involved and interested in, and given the current climate, the timing just felt right.

“It’s just very fitting for everyone right now, but I would say for someone like Porpentine, a trans artist, who has been dealing with things like this for a very long time before it became public discourse,” said Essevia. “They’re just two artists who have been committed in politics and topics everyone is involved in now but weren’t before.”

As it reflects the current dystopic mood of our society, it also invokes representation in its own way. Despite the fact that there is not an overall solid cast of characters or character development, there is building in the way of the one true character of the game; a cyborg named Aria End.

“[She] has been described as a cyborg woman with trans guts, who is kind of living in this world, but kind of totally controlled by the different AIs that are put into the game that control both inhabitants and this figure,” said Essevia. “One can think about what the relationship between a queer or trans body is in the world today and whatever measures or mechanisms are controlling those bodies and what those bodies want to be.”

Image result for dirtscraper ICA

While the conversations about this collaboration had begun prior to being contacted by the ICA, Burr and Porpentine did specifically work on this piece for the ICA and the museum’s current show, “Declaration”. Originally shown in Sundance as a film, Burr and Porpentine were looking for an institution to house the installation as they were hoping for it to be properly displayed. “As part of it being born in the world as an installation, that was something specific to the ICA,” Essevia said.

One of the important questions that this installation brings to the table is really how different would the experience be if it were not interactive. 

“You would lose a lot. [The] idea of it being interactive while you not having any control in liberating these people or doing anything to their daily ant farm life is this whole metaphor,” said Essevia. “While you might have control to move up and down in this life, you don’t really have any control to change the narrative or circumstances for the figures which is metaphorical for so many things going on politically.”

While so many of the exhibits at the ICA at VCU right now are, of course, made to make you think and question things, “Dirtscraper” is the only one that makes you actually feel it.

“Dirtscraper” is open now at the ICA at VCU as part of their Declaration show running until Sept. 9.

Breaking Out Of Her Room: Groundbreaking Work By Nidaa Badwan For The ICA Opening

David Streever | April 4, 2018

Topics: “100 Days of Solitude, art, Declaration, ICA, Institute for Contemporary art VCU, Nidaa Badwan, photography

Nidaa Badwan lived in isolation for some 20 months in a tiny room in occupied Gaza, under a bare bulb and a single window. After her first hundred days of exile, she began a photographic self-portrait series, titled “100 Days of Solitude.” Fresh from exhibits across Europe and New York City, she’s making her Virginia debut in Declaration, the opening exhibition for the groundbreaking of the Institute for Contemporary Art April 21.

Her exile began after harassment by Hamas militias, something she described as routine. “It happens with women who are ‘different’, who do not walk in the same line, to those who try to walk off the track,” she said. “But no one talks about this, because those who undergo it are ashamed.”

Originally printed in RVA #32 Spring 2018, you can check out the issue HERE or pick it up around Richmond now. 

Badwan was initially placed under house arrest for eight days after a confrontation with Hamas at a youth arts program. She was told she would have to wear a face-covering veil and only travel with male relatives. Instead, she stayed in her room, where she found inspiration in the Gabriel García Márquez novel her work pays homage to, One Hundred Years of Solitude.

“The beauty of this book is that there is a city. Inside this city is a house; inside this house, there is a room. It looks a lot like my situation, or my room: Inside this house, inside this city, isolated from the world,” she said. “It is the same story of this city.” Macondo, the city of Marquez’s story, may not exist under that name, but for Badwan, it is real nonetheless.

The bold colors and strong play between light and shadow in each portrait, mixed with the partial obscurement of Badwan’s face, have drawn comparisons to Caravaggio paintings, surprising her. “I did not know Caravaggio until I finished this project and people in Italy started talking about the resemblance to him,” she said. “I went to see his paintings and I was shocked, as if I had been there with him when he was painting his works. I immediately sensed how he thought, what was going on inside his head…”

Her work is time intensive and painterly, both in the process and end result. She said her work takes time because she only uses natural light. “For every picture it takes almost a month because I study the light, the shadow, the position, all the details that want to put in the picture, to have a work like a painting,” she said.

Loneliness is a central theme in her work, something she describes as both universal and deeply personal. “Loneliness is a very personal thing, very special. Everyone can feel differently from the other,” she said, separating the theme of loneliness in her work from the political conditions of life in Gaza. “Under occupation, or without occupation. When you’re alone, you do not ask yourself what’s out there.”

The Institute for Contemporary Art is a fitting space to show this work, which was born out of seclusion and isolation. The spacious modernist building, designed by Steven Holl Architects of New York, is situated along Broad St. between Belvidere St. and Pine St., on the border of the neighborhood rebranded as the Richmond Arts District in 2012.

“It’s a public space, intended for conversation and bringing people together,” Chief Curator Stephanie Smith said when I met with her in February. “It’s been intentionally designed with windows and skylights to be porous and open. We want to be a convening place for conversations.”

That intention extends to the two entranceways. One door opens on Belvidere, the other on Pine. They’re equal in size and scale, Smith noted, saying, “There’s no front door here. We have a campus and a city entrance. The goal is to create a shared spaced between VCU and the city.”

The open design of the ICA, the way it connects two segments of the city, is a strong contrast to Badwan’s work. Her photos are tightly composed, almost cramped, and full with color, symbols, and meaning. They’ll be placed on open walls in an expansive room with soaring ceilings. Directly across from her solitary scenes will be a collaborative installation with fabric and thread, designed to bring strangers together in conversation.

Smith, a recent hire at the ICA, came to Richmond in 2016 after a prestigious career that’s included long stints as the chief curator of both the Art Gallery of Ontario and the University of Chicago’s Smart Museum of Art. She described the recent staff turnover and construction delays as not unusual for such a large project, but was confident about the opening, saying, “It’s a short runway for an exhibition of this scale. It’s all really intense and really exciting.”

In addition to Badwan’s work, the non-collecting institution will open with a wide slate of works, including the anti-racist sculptural series REWIND by Paul Rucker, a citywide exhibit by Detroit-based printmaker Amos Paul Kennedy Jr., and a media installation by Peter Burr and Porpentine Charity Heartscape.

Smith described the variety of opening pieces as part of the mission of the institute, connecting local, national, and international artists all in one space from a variety of disciplines. “The exhibit is diverse in all the ways you can think about that, culturally, artistically,” she said.

Although many of the exhibits make strong statements, Smith said none of them had been chosen to fulfill a particular agenda, saying, “We’re a public institution. We don’t take a political stance in support of a particular policy or person, but we do take on ethical or moral stances.” Above all, she says they “stand behind freedom of expression and art,” which she describes as having a transformative power.

Badwan’s work touches on many political topics, especially those relating to Israel and Palestine, but Smith described the work as political only in the lowercase-p sense, used to describe personal politics and the important choices individuals make in their lives. “She’s someone who was dealing with an intense situation and her response was to pull inside and imagine another world,” Smith said. “She chose to respond to [imprisonment] with art in a really disciplined way.”

Badwan expressed a similar sentiment when asked about political content in her work, describing it as, “Zero. In art, I like to talk about things that interest me. Politics do not interest me.” Although she describes her self-isolation as an act of political protest, she sees the art that came out of that period as transcending mere politics.

Even before Smith knew Badwan’s story, though, what first drew her to Badwan’s art was the power of the imagery, which she saw in 2016 in New York City. “The work is beautiful. She has an exquisite sense of space, color, and composition. Visitors who don’t know anything about the backstory can be drawn in just by the imagery.”

The work makes statements about gender and discrimination, most notably in a piece Badwan identified as the most important. It depicts her playing an oud, a lute common in the Middle East, to silence a hostile rooster. In one interview, she describes the rooster as symbolic of men, particularly in Arabic symbolism, and is blunt about the message, saying, “With my gesture, I invite the rooster to shut up and let me be free to express myself and my art.”

Despite the restrictions on her personal life imposed by Hamas, Badwan enjoyed a rich creative life inside her room, and she made plans to debut “100 Days of Solitude” in East Jerusalem. This too, was restricted, although this time by the Israeli authorities, who refused to let her exit the Gaza Strip to attend.

After her self-portraits gained attention in 2015, largely through her social media presence on the website 500px and an interview with a New York Times reporter, she was finally able to leave Gaza. Before she received her invitation, to Monte Grimano and Montecatini in Italy, she told the Times interviewer that her situation was dire, saying, “I’m ready to die in this room unless I find a better place.”

It’s a sentiment expressed on her 500px profile too, where her one-line biography reads, “Finding a Safe Place”, and in notes, she’s written about her self-portrait series, where she wrote, “In the first months of self-imprisonment I contemplated committing suicide.”

The invitation to Italy came via the diplomatic efforts of a Franciscan, Father Ibrahim Faltas, of the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem. Since her arrival, she’s taught at the University of Design in San Marino, and exhibited new work in Denmark, Berlin, France, and the United States.

I asked her if Italy and Europe had proven to be that safe, or better, place. Her answer was conflicted. While she enjoys greater freedom in Italy, she also described a sense of loss.

“I feel like I’ve entered this game called “Solitude” and it’s like a video game,” she said. The move from Gaza was like successfully progressing through a video game only to encounter greater difficulty. “I passed the first level, I won, and now I move to the second level. The theme is different, but it is a higher level of the solitude I had inside my room.”

She still feels isolated, but within a new context, she explained. “In the first level I was locked inside my room, inside a closed city, and there I had my world. But now the opposite has happened. Now I have the whole world, free, all open, but I do not have a room. I do not have my room.”

Photos Courtesy of Nidaa Badwan

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