Art in sacred space, Healing House community meeting on March 30, 2016. Works from this session were integrated into the installation “Where We Move | Donde Nos Movemos”.
These months in Cusco have been tremendous! The core of my artist residency has been facilitating collective-art experiences at Healing House: workshops, informal creative sessions, and the open studio. In parallel I organized an open-mic series for performing and literary arts hosted by Conscious Arts Alliance partner ICPNA Cusco (Av. Tullymayo 125). This week brings to conclusion residency programming: the final Open Mic tonight, Wed. Apr. 13, 7-9pm, and reception for my exhibition “Movement: Beyond Hand-to-Mouth” on Fri. Apr. 15, 6-9pm with presentation from 7-8pm.
A friend traveling from the US lends a hand installing “Abajo | Below”.
As with any new endeavor, co-launching Healing House’s first artist residency has meant working amidst surprise and alongside rotating helpers. Staff, volunteers, and even a traveling friend have made the experience as a whole possible– for myself, open-mic contributors, workshops participants, and the public as audience and gallery visitors. It has been no small feat! I extend gratitude to all the support that made the experiment possible: practical, moral, spiritual, up-close-and-personal, as well as at-a-distance. You have carried supplies, translated materials, sent encouraging notes, given warm hugs, and so much more.
At the heart of this work in community arts is bringing people together from various walks of life and creative expressions. So tonight on the Open Mic stage with its theme “Where We Move | Donde Nos Movemos” will be Grupo Darte, a collective with movement as its medium. Having myself experimented with movement in performance poetry and live music via project Emergence (2014), I look forward to Grupo Darte’s addition to an already wonderful line-up of poets and musicians including recurring contributors. In support of project La Puenta, women artisans also have been invited to sell their work at this week’s events. For more photos of past and upcoming events, visit my Facebook albums: (1) Peru & La Puneta, and (2) Artist Residency, Jan. to May 2016.
Commissioned bordado (embroidery) “Las Tres Pachas” by Bartolinas de Olla-Juli (Puno), a women’s artisanal association in collaboration with Peruvian feminist agency Movimiento Manuela Ramos.
