photoville exhibition at brooklyn bridge park
On a sweltering day in September of 2021, a group of my loved ones, peers children pets, joined me on Brooklyn Bridge to celebrate the opening of our art exhibit dándoles sus flores // giving them their flowers. This exhibit was co-curated with my student Jennifer Florencio. Throughout this process we selected three projects that represented distinct identities: A Black mother from Brooklyn giving advice to her 14-year-old daughter; A Nigerian mother recounting her experience growing up in a large family, and a madrina recounting her childhood in Mexico and moving to the U.S. The central collective piece centered around a collage I created of my abuelita holding my sister Jazmín. Surrounding abuelita were matriarch collages with roots in Eritrea, Panama, & México. A few months later, Jenni visited the exhibition with the matriarch she featured in her project, her madrina. Through tears and hugs, her madrina felt seen. On a 6x6 foot cube, this humble story of a Mexican immigrant from Puebla was on display. Against the Manhattan skyline, the foregrounded image of a brown woman with a stoic face framed by two smaller smiling versions of her younger self in the distance, showcased our hidden stories in plain sight. In some ways, because you need to scan the QR code, the story was buried. You had to read and interact with the piece to feel what her story was about.
The beauty in these open spaces is that they are intergenerational in nature. Because they are open, public, and free, many folks can participate. Several generations were present: my grandmother displayed in the background, my closest friends from Los Angeles, my student and mentee, my mentor and her daughters. Aída, Madrina, Ariana, Wendy, Sonia, Jenni, Lucía, Marcela. Although not blood related, we are deeply connected in the roles we’ve played in each other’s lives and in the significance of the abuelita knowledge each of us has inherited and shared with each other. It’s in these spaces where we can truly bring our full selves. The physical space of a public park instead of an institution allowed us to be in that space with our children, our dogs, our sweat, our hearts, and literally our full selves. It is a deeply authentic, truly intergenerational experience.
dándoles sus flores, Photoville Abstract, 2021
A month ago, Jenni and I presented on our WOCArchive projects and curating the Photoville exhibit at the National Council for Teachers of English (NCTE). At the end of our presentation, my colleague Laura approached us to affirm and celebrate our work in a way that I’m not sure she was even sure she was giving us our flowers. She shared what resonated most with her about our work and then mentioned she was so happy to finally meet Jenni because she had been in touch with her work over the last year. Laura used to jog at Brooklyn Bridge Park along the pier. I thought to myself, wow. Across space and time this project was still resonating with folks --- we are still connecting. Although she wasn’t there for the opening, and I sincerely didn’t know she was familiar with our project, she felt she knew us intimately because she ran past our photos week after week over a year ago. Because she had experienced that public space, she was able to impart her knowledge to someone else. To share the project with others. That experience shaped something for her which further shaped things for the teachers she works with the research she is a part of etc.