Project for Empty Space is pleased to announce the 2022 Newark Artist Accelerator grant recipients which include: Antoinette Ellis-Williams, Bikier Hayes, Cazorla + Saleme, David Orrell, Eirini Linardaki & Melanie Levick-Parkin, Kim Hill, Kwesi Kwarteng, and Monifa Kincaid.

The 2022 Newark Artist Accelerator is a project grant for Newark-based, multidisciplinary visual artists. This year’s grants were awarded up to $7,500. Projects are artist-led and could include collaborative ventures, pop-up exhibitions, events, and interventions of an ephemeral nature that are radically accessible to public audiences.

Project-based grants were awarded support in the amount of $7,500. Projects are artist-led, and could include collaborative ventures, pop-up exhibitions, events, and interventions of an ephemeral nature that are radically accessible to public audiences.

• RED DIRT & POT LIQUOR: TRACING LEGACY & MEMORY OF BLACK WOMEN | Antoinette Ellis-Williams ($7,500)
  Red Dirt & Pot Liquor: Tracing Legacy & Memory of Black Women is a storytelling archival project. RDPL will unpack themes associated with selective memory, memory, and legacy. The artist will collect and archive audio stories from Black women elders from the Newark area. Together they will create a deconstructed group quilt consisting of traditional quilt-making materials, audio and video stories and songs, shadow box stories, and other immersive mediums.

  Red Dirt & Pot Liquor: Tracing Legacy & Memory of Black Women will conclude with an exhibition that includes the collected audio, an experimental film, and the group- created quilt. Lead artist Antoinette Ellis-Williams hopes this project will provide elder women from the community with opportunities to laugh, share stories, and build community.

  Antoinette Ellis-Williams is the Chair and Professor of Women’s & Gender Studies at New Jersey City University. Ellis-Williams is an emerging Jamaican born multi-media, interdisciplinary abstract contemporary artist, and poet based in Newark, New Jersey.

• LENZ OF THE STREET | BIKIER HAYES  ($7,500)
  Lenz of the Street is a mini festival that shares the history of Newark through raw footage, and street photography. Producer Bikier Hayes hopes to highlight images of everyday people who live in Newark’s outer wards, reshaping the narrative around oppressed communities. The multi-day happening will include exhibitions, performances, film screenings, all-ages workshops and games, educational and health awareness opportunities, and more.

  Bikier Hayes is an artist and street photojournalist based in Newark, New Jersey. Through thoughtful documentation, Hayes shines a light on the people, places, and things that he encounters daily in the streets of Newark. He hopes his lens will provide impact and insight into the importance of community.

• MAGICAL ENCOUNTERS AT SPECTRUM OF JOY | CAZORLA + SALEME  ($7,500)
  Magical Encounters at Spectrum of Joy is a series of five free bilingual (Spanish and English) family artmaking workshops held in partnership with the Newark Public Library and the NPL maker space. The workshops are set inside of Spectrum of Joy, a youth creative space, which is filled with colorful seating and youthful sculpture that prompts imagination.

  During these workshops, the artists will explore modes of cultural expression (through food, music, horticulture, and more) and introduce various art-making techniques. The program is open to families, and children of all ages.

  Cazorla + Saleme are a Latinx artist duo of aunt and niece who joined their artistic strengths to create public art that blends cultures and empowers communities.

• THE HAIR•ITAGE PROJECT | DAVID ORRELL  ($7,500)
  The Hair•itage Project is an exploration and chronicle of Black hair’s journey and contributions to American culture. By pulling from cultural references, including historical events, motifs, and symbols, the work will feature uniquely braided hairstyles found throughout the African diaspora. The Hair•itage Project seeks to highlight reasons why Black hair is not just “hair.”

  The Hair•itage Project will include collaborators: Jasmine Larmond (Master Hairdresser), Ashley Allen (MUA), Zunyda Watson & Simone Thompson (Fashion Designers/Stylists), and Brianna Sealey (Set Decorator/Prop Master).

  Together they will create several series of images, a photojournal of Black-owned businesses dedicated to hair, and a short film.

  David Christopher Orrell is a fine art photographer born and raised in Newark, NJ, with a discipline in portrait and documentary photography; his work is influenced by community, fashion, and Black culture.

• RAISED_FLAGS // THE MANY HOMES PROJECT |  EIRINI LINARDAKI & MELANIE LEVICK-PARKIN  ($7,500)
  RAISED_FLAGS // the many homes project is a public art project, co-created by artist-researchers Eirini Linardaki and Melanie Levick-Parkin.

  The organizers will lead a series of convenings that prompt personal and family heritage narratives through informal interviews and ethnographic methods, supported by diachronic reflections on local heritage and history, in order to co-produce visual narratives meaningful to the participants, community, and location. Contents will then inform the design of textile flags that re-contextualize, represent, and make visible the community’s multi-faceted belongings in an expressive and inclusive way.

  Eirini Linardaki was born in Athens, she has lived in many countries where she develops public art projects involving local communities, especially through workshops on accessibility and multiculturalism. She incorporates historic imagery and social change history in her discourse and anthropological design in her collages, paintings, designs, animations, and drawings.  She had numerous solo and group exhibitions throughout the world and several public commissions in Athens, Paris, New York, and Newark, NJ.

  Melanie Levick-Parkin is a feminist design researcher and design educator, with an interest in heritage, human-making practices, and visual/material language. There is a particular focus on gender and design in her research and she works within speculative and design anthropological methods and approaches. She is passionate about situating design in the context of political, social, and environmental justice and ethics, and creating space for others to have a visual voice.

• STRANGE FRUIT |  KIM HILL ($7,500)
  Strange Fruit dismantles and demystifies how watermelons have been historically used to demean and exploit Black people from the Diaspora to Detroit. Interdisciplinary artist, Kim Hill hopes to reclaim the narrative with a series of images co-created by Newark’s youth and elders. Multi-media sets will be used to re-create the homes of diaspora descendants (as far back as the 40’s to the present day) where many of these conversations took place; using interactive video, photography, fiber, paint, and bespoke furniture. The final series will be presented in an exhibition sparking nostalgia, ideas, and shared lived experiences for audiences to engage with.

  Kim Hill is a veteran musician/actor that discovered textile and furniture design during the intersection of her perimenopausal stage of life and lockdown with her pre-teen son. Her work explores race and identity through fiber, color, texture, and the humor she needs to navigate working while hot… Otherwise known as her “Hot Flash alerts”. Her lived experiences are woven into her work, making it a tactile denouement signature to Hill’s style and approach to life and art.

• NEWARK: GATEWAY CITY |  KWESI KWARTENG ($7,500)
  Led by Kwesi Kwarteng, but driven by contributors, Gateway City brings together various Newark-based migrant communities to contribute towards making a new body of work. This series’ primary material is cultural fabrics, sourced from Newark businesses and donated by residents. The materials are sewn and stitched together with hand-dyed fabrics to weave a portrait of the Gateway City, where viewers can see themselves within it.

  Born in Ghana, and now living in Newark, Kwesi Kwarteng uses cultural fabrics to create large-scale artworks that represent the immigrant experience through the lens of an immigrant living in the United States. His work seeks to encourage togetherness and address related issues such as anti-immigration or xenophobia.

• REFLECTION |  MONIFA KINCAID ($7,500)
  REFLECTION is a multidisciplinary and collaborative performance art project inspired by a local mural titled  The Reflective Black Body  by Layqua Nuna Yawar. This project will reflect the choreographic vision of two New Jersey-based dancers/choreographers, the directorial style of videographer Ryan Arnez Monroe, and the musical talent of violinist Najee Williams, combined with the overall production leadership from visual artist and former choreographer Monifa Kincaid.

  Monifa Kincaid’s artistic background began with an 18-year professional career in contemporary dance, rhythm tap dance, choreography, and as a dance educator in the NYC public school system. In 2018, her practice expanded to multi-disciplinary visual arts. Since, she has led a number of initiatives that merge performing and visual arts, and has exhibited in many Tri-state areas art spaces.