Howl! Happening Presents: “Bringing Back Bowery: Public Art as Protest” Pop Up Exhibition
Bringing Back Bowery: Public Art as Protest
Curated by Sono Kuwayama
Presented by Howl! Happening: An Arturo Vega Project
August 13–August 23, 2020
Open Thursday–Sunday | 11 AM–6 PM
Limited Entry
With the recent landscape of plywood, the vibrancy of our history and our neighborhood has also been shuttered. I envision the Bowery and Second Avenue, and all the streets in our neighborhood that have been boarded over, becoming a beautiful museum or gallery of art—free for the public, which has not had any opportunity to look at art firsthand in over 100 days.
—Sono Kuwayama
After the tragic death of George Floyd, impassioned citizens in cities around the world rose up together in a call for justice. The streets became the backdrop for our collective mourning, our outrage, and our plea for change. Opportunistic agitators took advantage of peaceful demonstrations and forced many businesses to board up storefronts all over New York. On the Bowery, a neighborhood with the reputation of creating beauty out of strife, the plywood barriers became windows into the hearts of the neighborhood’s artists.
Bringing Back Bowery: Public Art as Protest is a re-presentation of public artworks made in solidarity with the protest movement fighting for racial equality and police reform. This exhibition includes artworks by Izhar Patkin, Kamila Otcasek, Robert Blodgett, and Sono Kuwayama, as well as collaborations by James Rubio and Hitomi Nakamura, Pamela Sneed and Gail Thacker, and Maya Edelman, Scooter LaForge, and Sono Kuwayama.
The exhibition will be on view at Howl! Happening: An Arturo Vega Project beginning Thursday, August 13 through Sunday, August 23, from 11 AM–6 PM. To ensure the safety of the visitors, there will be limited entry of 10 people at any one time.
Visitors must wear masks, maintain social distancing, and register upon entry (providing their name and email address or phone number). Temperatures will be taken at the front door. People with a fever will be denied entry.
You can RSVP to [email protected].
About Howl Arts Inc.
Howl Arts Inc. (Howl) is dedicated to preserving the past and celebrating the contemporary culture of New York City’s East Village and Lower East Side. Howl showcases the art, activism, history, culture, and counterculture at the heart of this community through the works of established, emerging, and underrepresented artists. From fine art and performances to Beat poetry and punk rock, and activism and protest, Howl reaches nearly 10,000 annual visitors. All Howl programming is free and open to the public.
Web:
www.howlarts.org
Social Media:
Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook: @howlhappening
Contact: David Simantov