Greater Cincinnati art lovers can help create an interactive exhibition at Wave Pool this August while celebrating the significant impact of numerous women in the process.
Wave Pool’s 2023 Vance Waddell Resident, Yohanna M. Roa, is using her five-week run in Cincinnati to showcase her multidisciplinary installation, “The New Historiographic Atlas, Documents and Portraits.”
The exhibit opens Wednesday, Aug. 16, and will remain on display at the Colerain Avenue gallery through Sept. 16.
The Colombian-born, New York-based Roa is known for creating textile cartography with portraits and stories shared with her. The self-described feminist visual artist and art historian wants to use her latest work to highlight memories, people and events sometimes hidden or obscured in the processes of writing history.
In Cincinnati, Roa is construction what she refers to as “the homeroom of the Textile Woman.” It’ll consist of embroidered portraits of women she’s known and left indelible marks on her life.
Roa plans to cover everything in the space with decorative fabrics full of repeated motifs. The aim is to point out a “metaphorical pattern of invisibility and obscuration of knowledge, activities and life processes – including resistance – produced by women throughout history,” according to an artist statement.
Roa also plans to honor the legacy of her mother and grandmother during a performance aspect of the installation. While covered with pattern fabrics, Roa will share stories about the other people portrayed in her embroidered archive.
Guests are invited to sit and share a story about a woman in their own lives as well. After the show, they can write their honoree’s name on Roa’s skirt to make it a permanent part of the collection.
“During the process, the space becomes filled with enormous emotions, stories, and memories that acquire additional significance when people share them as a group,” Roa said in a statement.
Roa is hosting three performances of “The New Historiographic Atlas, Documents and Portraits,” starting with opening night. The other shows are Saturday, Aug. 19, from 1 until 3 p.m., and Saturday, Aug. 26 at noon.
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