NYFA Fiscal Sponsorship Bids Farewell to 2016
Celebrating programs from the past year
NYFA Fiscal Sponsorship is proud to nurture the creation of art, support the free exchange of ideas, and celebrate the vitality of creativity in our society. In the spirit of the strength and hope we find in the work of artists, we are sharing highlights from the breadth of projects in 2016. With themes ranging from the Environment to the Criminal Justice System, and from projects focused on Intercultural Dialogue to Documenting the World, fiscally sponsored projects are energetically transforming the world.
Environment
Swale, Mary Mattingly (Sponsored Project)
Swale is a floating food forest that traveled NYC waterways during the summer and fall of 2016. The project imagines a world where healthy, fresh food is a free public service and not a commodity. The garden is built on a barge and it brought fresh food and public activities to communities around the city, and will re-launch in 2017. Swale’s project director Mary Mattingly is also a NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Sculpture ‘11 and her work has been exhibited at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes de la Habana, the International Center of Photography, the Seoul Art Center, the Brooklyn Museum, the New York Public Library, deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, and the Palais de Tokyo.
Blued Trees, Aviva Rahmani (Sponsored Project)
Blued Trees explores the causes of climate change by installing and copyrighting installations in the path of proposed natural gas pipeline expansions. The project encourages conversations around the meaning of “public good” in relation to using eminent domain for proposed fossil fuel technologies. Blued Trees is a division of Aviva Rahmani’s Gulf to Gulf project, which explores how art can affect climate change policy. Rahmani is an ecological artist, who describes her practice as “performing ecology.” She was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Ecology Residency with the International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP) in 2015, received an Arts and Healing Network 2009 award, and exhibited at the Venice Biennale 2007. Rahmani was named a NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Architecture/Environmental Structures/Design ‘16.
Criminal Justice System
Incorrigibles, Alison Cornyn (Sponsored Project)
Incorrigibles is a transmedia art project that collects and tells the stories of ‘incorrigible’ girls in the United States over the last 100 years. The project was recently awarded a 2017 Digital Projects for the Public Discovery Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, which will be used to develop the design documents and production plans for Incorrigibles’ web components. The project investigates the past and present state of juvenile justice and social services for girls. Presently, Incorrigibles is researching archival documents from the New York State Training School for Girls (1904-1975) and recording and sharing accounts of women alive today who were confined there. The project also includes organizing community engagement events to encourage critical analysis around youth detention and behavioral intervention. Alison Cornyn is an interdisciplinary artist whose work merges photography, media, and technology to create engaging environments, both online and as physical installations. The numerous awards she has received include a Peabody Award, the Gracie Allen Award for Women in Media, the Online News Association’s Award for Best Use of Multimedia, the Batten Award for Innovation, the National Press Club Award, and the Webby Award for net.art.
PROFILED, Kathleen Foster (Sponsored Project)
PROFILED is a feature-length documentary by Kathleen Foster about racial profiling and police brutality. The film weaves interviews with victims’ families and places police brutality within the historical context of racism in the United States. PROFILED is now being distributed by Women Make Movies and was screened at six film festivals and more than twenty colleges, museums, and community groups around the country in 2016. Post-screening discussions have sparked intense debates about race and racism in the U.S. today and motivated multiracial audiences to find ways to work for change. Foster joined NYFA Current for an interview about the film. Learn more about PROFILED’s Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign; it is currently raising funds to share the film with a wider audience and produce a Spanish translation.
The Pipeline Project, Anna Deavere Smith (Sponsored Project)
The Pipeline Project explores the school to prison pipeline through interviews, discussions, public gatherings and Notes from the Field, a theatrical performance by Anna Deavere Smith. Smith interviewed hundreds of individuals and used their words to create the dialogue for Notes from the Field, which is currently on tour. Smith is a playwright, actress, professor, and activist. She was the 2015 Jefferson Lecturer for the National Endowment for the Humanities and received the National Humanities Medal in 2013. Smith is also a MacArthur Fellow, recipient of The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, two Tony nominations, and two Obie awards.
Intercultural Dialogue
The Ruins of Lifta, Oren Rudavsky and Menachem Daum
The feature-length documentary, The Ruins of Lifta, made its NYC Premiere this year and is directed and produced by collaborators Menachem Daum and Oren Rudavsky. The film addresses the Israeli-Palestinian conflict when a Holocaust survivor and Nakba refugee intimately meet in Lifta. Lifta is the only Palestinian village abandoned during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war that has not been destroyed or repopulated by Jews. Daum and Rudavsky report that since the film was made, the city of Lifta is once again at risk of being developed. The Ruins of Lifta DVD will be released on April 4, 2017, and you can follow updates about Lifta on the film’s website. Daum and Rudavsky also collaborated on Hiding and Seeking and A Life Apart, both NYFA fiscally sponsored projects.
Salvation, Andres Serrano (Sponsored Project)
Salvation: The Holy Land documents photographer Andres Serrano’s visit to Israel. Viewing the world through the lens of a Mamiya RB67 camera, Serrano documents the landscape and people to explore religious faith. He visited sacred sites such as Bethlehem, Ramallah, Galilee, and the Dead Sea, and through the images we witness everyday life and celebration. These photographs were captured shortly before the resurgence of the Middle East conflict and Salvation: The Holy Land was published in 2016. Serrano is a NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Photography ‘87 and an internationally celebrated contemporary artist and photographer whose work explores religion, sexuality, and death. You can purchase your copy of Salvation: The Holy Land here.
Documenting the World
A Life in Photography, Diana Mara Henry (Sponsored Project)
Diana Mara Henry presents A Life in Photography, a limited edition photo book presenting the images and inside story from the First National Women’s Conference and the NY State Women’s meeting. “Through The Photographer’s Eyes: The Diana Mara Henry Photograph Collection” is currently on view at the University of Massachusetts Amherst W.E.B. Du Bois Library through January 27, 2017. Beginning in the late 1960’s, the collection documents the women’s movement, images of politicians, celebrities and scholars. Henry is a photojournalist whose work spans four decades of political, social, and cultural change in America. Widely published and exhibited, her work is part of permanent collections at institutions including the Schlesinger Library, the Library of Congress, Smithsonian, and the National Archives. A Life In Photography can be purchased directly through the artist.
Nuevo New York, Gabriel Rivera-Barraza (Sponsored Project)
Nuevo New York is a collection of portraits and brief interviews of influential Latin Americans who came to New York City to pursue their goals and ambitions. Each personality is an important player in their field, ranging from philanthropy and visual arts, to music, film, architecture, and fashion. The project is a collaboration between photographer Hans Neumann and Gabriel Rivera-Barraza, founder and president of GRB Communications. Nuevo New York was published in 2016 to rave reviews and can be purchased wherever books are sold.
NYFA Fiscal Sponsorship’s next quarterly no-fee application deadline is December 31, 2016, and you can learn more about NYFA’s Fiscal Sponsorship program here. Read more about other exciting projects utilizing sponsorship, in our NYFA Fiscal Sponsorship Directory.
– by Madeleine Cutrona, Program Officer for Fiscal Sponsorship
Image Credits appearing left to right in collage: Swale in the Bronx at Concrete Plant Park with Youth Ministries for Peace and Justice; image courtesy of PROFILED, Blued Trees Installation detail #2, 2016, 75’ x 25’, branches painted with a casein of buttermilk and ultramarine blue pigment and 10- 60” x 36” panels printed on translucent paper hung from gallery ceiling; Incorrigibles installation in Visions of Confinement at Hunter East Harlem Gallery, 2016, curated by Arden Sherman and Isaac Scott, photo credit Nupur Mathur; Welfare Rights advocates celebrating passage of their plank at the First National Women’s Conference, Houston, 1977, copyright © 1977 Diana Mara Henry; Children’s Toy Store, Ramallah, Andres Serrano; image courtesy of The Ruins of Lifta; Jana Pasquel de Shapiro, President, Munnu/The Gem Place courtesy of Nuevo New York; image courtesy of The Pipeline Project.
Image Credits: Swale at Brooklyn Bridge Park Pier 6; Blued Trees Brush Mountain #1, 2016, photographic documentation of trees painted with a casein of buttermilk and ultramarine blue pigment to grow moss; image courtesy of PROFILED; image courtesy of The Pipeline Project; image courtesy of The Ruins of Lifta; Arabian Nights, Old City of Jerusalem, Andres Serrano; Women’s Pentagon Action with puppets by Amy Trompetter, copyright © 1980 Diana Mara Henry; Carlos Campos, Fashion Designer, image courtesy of Nuevo New York.
