New York, NY, June 4, 2024—Korea Art Forum (KAF) is excited to announce the continuation of Shared Dialogue, Shared Space (2024 SDSS), which commissions artists selected from KAF’s open calls to create and present new participatory work in everyday, public settings. This initiative integrates art into people’s ordinary activities in public and private spaces, exploring and crystallizing the conditions and impacts of creative moments in everyday experiences. 

 

First launched in 2020, SDSS has not only survived the challenges of the pandemic but has thrived, demonstrating art's transformative ability to integrate into and enrich daily life. SDSS underscores the essential role of art in human existence. When life is in crisis, art activates to intervene. In this context, “art” refers to the ability to invent solutions to given critical problems, and SDSS promotes this human capacity for resilience and creativity.

 

This year’s SDSS will begin by setting up art stations at the yoga and tai chi square in Bowne Playground, Flushing. This location, directly accessible from Sanford Avenue at Union Street, has been chosen for the convenience of visitors and community members alike. Participatory art activities will begin at 12 p.m. and continue until 4 p.m. on Saturday, June 8th, ensuring that participants have ample time to enjoy the events. Featured artists include Akiko Ichikawa, Eiko Nishida, Sari Nordman, and Thomas Gallagher. 

 

Akiko Ichikawa has translated sayings found on t-shirts worn by pedestrians in the community into Japanese. She will stencil these Japanese translations on secondhand t-shirts at the events. The artist’s activity also includes a skillshare session on producing one’s own stencils for fabric. Limited, Limited Edition (Flushing) is a way of engaging passersby and participants, the artist creating singular cross-cultural experiences and an imaginative space transcending consumerism and any one-dimensional take on Japanese culture. 

 

Eiko Nishida will build curiosities amongst neighbors of diverse backgrounds with an activity that sparks conversation. She will scatter pine barks on the ground, each with a text on the back. Participants can take a bark with them. In exchange, they will glue a text stripe they choose to the back of a new bark and add the new one to the collection. These activities aim to share and acknowledge cultural differences among diverse participants while illuminating the changing meanings of the same word or phrase in different contexts.

 

Sari Nordman will create Anxiety Lean-to, a public and social engagement project involving knotting workshops to create tapestries using recycled plastic films and traditional Finnish rya rug weaving methods. The workshops will culminate in an environmentally-themed fiber arts installation of lean-tos, addressing the problems of single-use plastics and their negative impact on nature and people, particularly in underserved communities. During the collaborative process of making lean-tos from plastic tapestries, participants will exchange their perceptions and reflections on recycling, single-use plastics, and solutions to plastic waste problems. This will raise their awareness of environmental issues and root causes.

 

Thomas Gallagher will create an opportunity for neighbors from the community to bridge language and cultural barriers: to speak, hear, and understand the “voice of the other” through a game he calls Lingo Bingo. His project draws on the vernacular visual language and play mechanics of the game Bingo, replacing the numbers with words and phrases in multiple languages to create a low-risk, playful setting for participants of diverse cultural backgrounds to discover shared values. 

 

The four artists anticipate their participatory art activities promoting community building among people of diverse backgrounds, fostering respect for immigrants from a variety of cultures, and giving space to values that span cultures such as climate justice, racial justice, and equality. Participants can take home objects, such as a bingo card or a work they created, to remember and reflect on their projects’ experiences.

 

SDSS offers artist-run workshops, performances, and participatory activities free of charge with live interpretation services in English, Chinese, Korean, and Spanish at local parks in community hubs. ASL services are also available with two weeks’ advance notice.

 

SDSS connects the public to art and culture, focusing on immigrant communities, people with disabilities, and those experiencing economic hardship. The initiative fosters dialogues between audiences and artists, covering a wide range of subject matter and the multidimensional impact of art on cultural production and social change. It particularly seeks to disrupt rising anti-Asian sentiments and racial divides entrenched in all sectors of American life. 

 

For the past four years, SDSS has broadened communication channels between the contemporary art world and local communities in New York City, advancing the artists’ creative endeavors to engage the public. This year, again, SDSS promises to be an immersive and captivating experience showcasing the artists and the communities' diverse talents and perspectives. All are welcome to attend, and admission is always free to SDSS events. 

 

Program Summary

 

2024 Shared Dialogue, Shared Space: Part I, No. 1 will be held at the Bowne Playground in Flushing, Queens on Saturdays, June 8th, 22nd and 29th from 12 p.m. to 4 p.m. The events will feature participatory art created by Akiko Ichikawa, Eiko Nishida, Sari Nordman, and Thomas Gallagher, to celebrate diverse cultures and traditions in New York City. 

For more information, please send an email to info@kafny.org