“Another world is possible,” Chicago June 2020. Photo courtesy of Isaiah ThoughtPoet Veney and the Field Museum.
The Pandemic Collection is a visionary project that brings together Field Museum staff and community partners to build an archive for the future.
The project uses co-curatorial methods to record social and material culture responses to the COVID-19 pandemic and simultaneous related activism for social justice. Using an expansive conceptualization of environment, artmaking, and creativity, the project explicitly engages with themes of material means of coping, social organization, and the natural world to better understand people’s shared and varied pandemic-era contexts. Through the Pandemic Collection I am fortunate to work with a number of creative and brilliant people in Chicago and beyond. Visit our project website to learn more.
Amira interviews her mother Meliha.
Gathering Grounds collects stories and images about the social life of coffee rituals from the former Yugoslavia in order to build connections among refugees and expand awareness of the region’s diverse histories and global diaspora.
I began the project as a response to women refugees’ sadness that “No one asks us about our lives before the war,” and the younger generation’s desire to learn about their parents’ experiences. I was served Bosnian coffee throughout my field research and noticed that people shared knowledge, information and emotion when serving and drinking this coffee. In the Bosnian tradition, “coffee is for conversation,” as one participant, Meliha, puts it. I am joined by contributors Dijana Hodžić, Elmina Kulašić, Dženita Lukačević-Vilić, Memo Nuhbegović, Adela Sajdel-Cerić, and Snežana Žabić.
Lemon balm and pineapple sage. Jesse Wilson’s Solitary Garden.
This Is Not Neutral Ground examines efforts to create nourishing outdoor spaces in under-served communities in New Orleans and Chicago.
The project focuses on institutional and interpersonal encounters made possible through artmaking, food, and performance to shed light on connections between changes to land and changes in understandings of health and wellbeing.
Read my essay about Solitary Gardens, a social practice artwork dedicated to ending solitary confinement. Established first in New Orleans, artist jackie sumell has seeded these gardens with community partners across North America.