Tuesday, November 29, 2016

Creative Capital Professional Development Presentation — Artist, Agitator, Activist "Hot Buttons"

DOEprojekts (Deborah Adams Doering and Glenn N. Doering) were pleased to present work related to their upcoming "Migrations" exhibition at the Creative Capital Professional Development Seminar, led by artist/entrepreneur/author Jackie Battenfield on November 7, 2016. 

CCPD artists and participants brainstormed with DOEprojekts/Doerings on promoting the "Migrations" exhibition, gave positive feedback on the "Migrations" preliminary images, and also suggested additional venues for the exhibition, which will open initially on Thursday, February 23, 2017 at the Sheen Center, 18 Bleecker Street, NYC. 


DOEprojekts continues to work with the women of Savane Kigali and Pax Rwanda on "Migrations Maps." The exquisitely embroidered maps showcase continents with no borders -- the maps focus on "Coreforms" -- zero, one, hyphen, tilde and period (aka circles, vertical lines, horizontal lines and points). (See http://doeprojekts.org/coreforms-and-keywords-thoughts-on-invitations-to-interact/). Visual metaphors for these works include freedom to move across borders through digital technologies, through education, through imagination, or through physical mobility. 







Writer Allison C. Meier explains in her essay about "Migrations":
"The Migration embroidered maps are stitched by members of Savane Kigali, a Rwandan women's collective. There is the migration of their hands over each flowing stitch, and a sense of time, as each map can take months to finish. Then there is the journey of the map back to the United States, where it started as an idea before it was made into an artifact. Furthermore, as the collective in Africa includes women from both the Hutu and Tutsi tribes, which had a bloody genocide, there is yet another level of connection evoked in the work, even if it's not visible to the eye.
"The 'Hot Buttons,' DOEprojekt's hand-cut stencil and print works, visualize the various ways a person can be defined when passing between these oscillating borders: expatriate; immigrant; refugee; evacuee; displaced person; alien. Another reads: pilgrim; colonist; pioneer; or artist; agitator; activist.
"While all these words are familiar, and likely evoke some image in the imagination, seeing them linked together asks for a reevaluation of which we consider synonyms, which as secluded states of being. And turning the words into objects reduces some of that labeling power. As does the participatory element of them, involved in past DOEprojekts exhibitions, where anyone can take wax crayon rubbings of these words, and carry them away into another movement." (from Allison C. Meier's essay)

DOEprojekts will lead a number of "Coreforms and Keywords" art-making workshops and participatory events as part of the 7-week exhibition. If you would like to participate in an upcoming 2017 art-making workshop, or have a group who would benefit from one of our workshops, please email DOEprojekts@gmail.com.



In addition to preparing for "Migrations," DOEprojekts has been invited to participate in a group show titled "Protect your Rights" at ShuaSpace at 340 Summit Avenue in Jersey City, NJ. A mono-block print of "Artist • Agitator • Activist" will be part of the exhibition.
We look forward to hearing from you! 
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