Happy May Day!

May Day marks the beginning of summer in the northern hemisphere, celebrated halfway between the spring equinox and summer solstice. This seasonal greeting is, appropriately, a celebration of warmth and light as I transition towards personal growth and pursue some big goals. 

Over the past year, I have created work with others (more on this below!), learned to honor my voice, accepted a spot in the MFA program at Cornell University, and taken the leap to be a full-time artist! 

Since 2018, I have worked at The Greenway supporting the creation of new public art in downtown Boston. In 2021 I was promoted to Associate Curator of Public Art, and in 2022 I collaborated with Leslie Condon and the Pao Art Center on my first big curatorial project. We worked together to not only bring Cheryl Wing-Zi Wong’s The Year of the Tiger to Boston’s Chinatown but also to engage the piece through a monthly summer performance series. VISIONS/VOICES was a beautiful celebration of the community in Chinatown; it was a gift to see how the series and installation created connections and supported local artists in Boston.

One of the greatest gifts I received last summer was the opportunity to create “productive fictions” with the Design Studio for Social Intervention (DS4SI). As a member of the Collective Imagination cohort, I worked with other artists to envision and plan events that would create, a more just, connected, and creative public life. The inPUBLIC Summer Series celebrated public joy and love, especially for BIPOC bodies and minds, in the heart of downtown Boston. From double-dutch tournaments to a series centering resting in public green spaces, we built more free spatial arrangements.

Working with the team and community surrounding DS4SI has been a gift as I have found a community of like-minded creatives in Boston. And who made these cool posters,  you ask? Yours truly!

This winter, family health challenges once again reminded me about what matters most in my life: connection with others, having room to cherish and enjoy life, and honoring my creative spirit.  I made the exciting and vulnerable decision to both apply to graduate school and leave my full-time work curating public art.

I am deeply excited to be pursuing a Masters of Fine Arts starting this fall, focusing on social, ecological, and contextual practices at Cornell University! Until then, I am transitioning into my studio practice. I am grateful to have the time and space to open my mind and heart energetically before diving into rigorous study.

Some things I am excited to dig into this summer include:

A cyanotype banner public art project in Bloomington MN;

I hope to reinstall Abundance Among Us in Chinatown;

Creating an artist book holding my discoveries from the COVIctory Gardens Project

I look forward to sharing more of this with you in the coming months. Sending love and light from Boston, the beautiful homelands of the Pawtucket and Massachusett people. 

Sincerely,

P.S. An artist always can use a little help from a friend! If you were to seek to help me in any way, I would encourage you to do the following:

Check out these and other projects on my website

Follow me on instagram and like a whole bunch of my posts!

Buy some art in my shop and support my work!

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