Abrons Arts Center
Henry Street Settlement
466 Grand Street
New York, NY 10002
Information/registration: [email protected] or
T +1 212 598 0400 x 209
The word “unpack” has multiple entry points for a New Yorker, specifically artists. There is great transience due to space/money/availability/opportunity. Artists are always unpacking their belongings, thoughts, and artwork. The Abrons Arts Center (NYC) is presenting a series of workshops that honor the spirit of unpacking practice through discussion and physical processes.
Tamar Ettun
January 28, February 4 and 11
Takashi Horisaki
February 18 and 25, March 4
Park McArthur
March 11, 18 and 25
Lee Maida
April 1, 8, 15
Chelsea Knight
May 6, 13, 20
Each series of three sessions is 120 USD. Participate in all five for 500 USD.
This Is Not A Sculpture
Tamar Ettun leads this interdisciplinary production-based course focusing on sculpture and performance. Participants will be introduced to a variety of materials, construction techniques, and explore the movement possibilities with the finished objects. The students will have room to experiment with object-making, movement, dance, and sound while working on an individual or collaborative project.
Tuesdays, 7:30–9:30pm: January 28, February 4 and 11
Artist: Tamar Ettun
Casting, Architecture + Community
Working with artist Takashi Horisaki, participants will learn to observe and reconsider local architecture, while also developing basic casting techniques with materials like liquid latex and plaster. Through casting and conversation, we will design sculptural objects and constructions that respond to the physical and social fabric of our communities.
Tuesdays, 7–9 pm: February 18 and 25, March 4
Artist: Takashi Horisaki
If We Are Post-Human
A neologism of the 1980s, posthumanity or the post-human, now circulates widely as an idea, a place of agency and action, and even, a figure of contemporaneity. As Donna Haraway tells us in her introduction to When Species Meet, “We have never been human.” This reading group takes up this statement as a proposition: “If we are post-human, then what?”
From information technology to animal studies to disability studies to a general desire to rethink identity and relationality in exciting and capacious ways, this reading group looks at the ways feminists use posthumanity in their work. With artists working at the edge of these considerations, we will look at how these readings relate to aesthetics and the traditions of the avant garde.
Tuesdays, 7–9pm: March 4, 11, 18
Artist: Park McArthur
Not Nouveau
An experiment in contemporary ornamentation, Not Nouveau will be both a discussion and a studio for investigating ornamentation in contemporary art and culture. Over the course of three sessions, we will explore transitions in modern art and architecture between ornamentation and structure and consider the place of ornamentation today through text, image, and hands-on experiments from flower arrangement to clay sculpture.
Tuesdays, 7–9pm: March 25, April 1 and 8
Artist: Lee Maida
Experimental Documentary
This course explores categories of fiction and documentary in contemporary art. Participants will look at the way carefully constructed para-fictions engage and interact with the political. Looking at work by artists experimenting in this realm, students will research, write and produce two video projects: one short collaborative piece and one longer solo project.
Tuesdays, 7–9pm: May 6, 13 and 20
Artist: Chelsea Knight
