Collective Dreaming⬩lfacxnwc
A chance meeting between two members of art collectives who met in May of 2022 germinated the idea of bringing the art collectives, Los Fantasmas (from Denver) and #notwhite collective (from Pittsburgh, PA) together to begin collectively dreaming. Over the past two years of online meetings, members shared, learned and planned for two respective art exhibitions: one in Denver at Yolia ArtSpace and one in Pittsburgh at Artists Image Resource.
Saturday, August 3 – Saturday, October 19, 2024
YOLIA ARTSPACE ⬩ 901 Englewood Parkway, Suite 112. Englewood 80110
Saturday, January 11 – Monday, February 10, 2025
ARTISTS IMAGE RESOURCE ⬩ 518 Foreland St. Pittsburgh, PA 15212
Artist Workshops & Closing Reception
Saturday, October 19, 2024
Artist Workshops 1-5 pm ⬩ Gallery Talk & Closing Reception 5-7 pm
Events are free and open to the public.
Yolia ArtSpace | 901 Englewood Parkway, Suite 112. Englewood 80110
Sugar Skulls & Ofrendas ⬩ 1-7 pm
Join chicane #notwhite collective artist, Zena Ruiz, in decorating a sugar skull and writing a short poem to your deceased loved one. Sugar skulls are used as an offering and welcoming practice in Mexico used in Dia de los Muertos celebrations. Dia de los Muertos is a time when our loved ones who've passed return to the land of the living. Sugar skulls are decorated to honor and dedicated to a deceased loved one and placed at the ofrenda, a home altar.
Memory Tiles: Exploring Family Traditions and Cultural Connections ⬩ 2 pm
Participants will engage in a reflective and creative journey with Fran Flaherty and Veronica Corpuz to explore family traditions, cultural symbols, and personal memories that connect them to a loved one, especially an elder. Through storytelling and art, participants will create personalized “memory tiles” that reflect these meaningful connections.
The Intimacy of Touching through Photography ⬩ 3 pm
Carolina Loyola-Garcia will share her journey with photography and collage and engage the audience in an experiential workshop of image capturing and conversation.
Somatic Abolitionism ⬩ 4 pm
Meet artist and licensed clinical liberation specialist Liana Maneese to learn about the foundations and necessity of Somatic Abolitionism for all social justice practices, public and private.
Los Fantasmas Artist Collective was developed in the late 1990s by Carlos Fresquez, Tony Diego, Ismael Lozano and Josiah Lopez as a response to the local art scene that in our view treated BIPOC artists as “fantasmas” (ghosts) or “the unseen”. Now consisting of six Indigenous, Chicano, and Raza identifying artists, Los Fantasmas is dedicated to our communities to broaden the scope of venues available to BIPOC Artists throughout the Denver and greater Colorado area.
Throughout its history, LFAC has organized such events as Urban Decay, which transformed the Chicano Arts and Humanities Council Gallery into a vision that reflected the decay of the urban Chicano Neighborhood in which it was located. We participated in exhibits and panel discussions at the Sangre de Cristo Arts Center in Pueblo Colorado. We also curated a Dia de Muertos Exhibit with community discussions in Trinidad Colorado at the Corazon Gallery. More recently, LFAC has collaborated with youth organizations such as Colorado Circles for Change, Gang Rescue and Support Project, and the Denver Juvenile Diversion to facilitate classes for youth to participate in art exhibits alongside established artists. Raza Futura, our most recent exhibit was held at the Hideout Gallery and continued the vision. The exhibit included work from LFAC founding members, several upcoming artists, college students and youth artists following our original vision and mission to create space for the unseen BIPOC artist.
Members:Tony Diego, Carlos Fresquez, Juan Fuentes, Grace Gutierrez, Josiah Lee Lopez, and Izzy Lozano
The #notwhite collective is a group of 13 women artists whose mission is to use non-individualistic, multi-disciplinary art to make our stories visible as we relate, connect, and belong to the Global Majority. We utilize our arts practice singularly and collectively to Excavate Histories, Expose Realities, and Exorcise Oppression.
We are bi/multi-racial/cultural, immigrant or descendants of immigrants investigating the many ways we are seen or not seen, how we self-identify and how we seek liberation through sharing space and stories; research and art-making; discussing the history of imperialism and its effect on us, on the whole not-white world. We actively reject colonialism through our non-hierarchical process.
The #notwhite collective expresses the hybridized and multifaceted aspects of self-defined liberation; we accept cultural fluidity as a means of seeing and being seen, each member declaring their existence, individually and collectively, through our voices, bodies and art.
#NOTWHITE COLLECTIVE⬩SISTER SOUL SPECTRUM
Thursday, September 19 – Sunday, December 15, 2024
Gallery Hours with KST Presents Performances
Kelly Strayhorn Theater | 5941 Penn Ave. Pittsburgh, PA 15206
Sister Soul Spectrum exhibits artworks from the #notwhite collective. Spanning photography, painting, mixed media, and more, individual pieces explore cultural heritage, personal identities, and feminist ideologies. The exhibition investigates ways collective members are seen (or not seen) and how they seek liberation through sharing space, telling stories, researching, and making art.
Sister Soul Spectrum is on view at KST’s lobby gallery. The gallery is open to the public during and one hour before every KST Presents event. Arrive early and take a look!
