Chances are The Laundromat Project will be in your neighborhood this weekend or next. Come make t-shirts at the Studio Museum in Harlem, mix music at the Gold Star Laundromat in Washington Heights, or learn fun ways of going green at the Victory Laundromat in Staten Island. Bring your laundry and imagination! See details below.

Join The Laundromat Project at the Studio Museum in Harlem this Sunday, August 8th, 12-3pm for a special Target Free Sunday workshop

Image from The Laundromat Project's Works in Progress workshops at The Laundry Room.

Take Back the T-Shirt: Creating and printing your own t-shirt design
Bring the whole family to the museum to enjoy a t-shirt design and printing workshop led by The Laundromat Project's Teaching Artist Maya Valladares. Using stencils and stencil spray, this workshop teaches participants how to create a t-shirt design that reflects themselves and their neighborhoods. Participants choose images and colors that broadcast a unique individual message, which effectively allows them to "take back the t-shirt!" This is an eco-friendly activity -- please bring a gently used t-shirt to design.

Studio Museumin Harlem, 144 West 125th Street, New York, NY, 10027
Directions by subway: Take the A/B/C/D/2/3 train to 125th Street


Also...


Join Create Change Public Artist in Residence Bayeté Ross Smith at Gold Star Laundromat in Washington Heights on Saturday and Sunday, August 7th and 8th, 12-4pm for audio recording workshops

Audio Recording from Digital to Analog
Ross Smith will teach participants how to transfer audio from digital mediums to cassette tape. He will also go through the technical and creative aspects of combining a series of recordings into a cohesive sound piece. Participants will learn how to create a musical mix and simple mash-ups with and without a computer. Read more about his project here.

Gold Star Laundromat, 431 Edgecombe Avenue (and 155th Street)
Directions by subway: Take C train to 155th Street or 1 train to 157th Street


Join Create Change Public Artist in Residence Tattfoo at Econo Wash Laundromat in Staten Island on Saturday, August 14th, 2-4pm for seedball and solar print-making workshops

Seedball and Solar Print-Making
Tattfoo will teach his neighbors how to beautify their neighborhoods through two workshops. Participants will learn how to make "seedballs," a mixture of soil and clay, which is ultimately planted in their neighborhoods. Participants will also learn how to make solar prints using wild flowers that were planted by the artist and the GREENade team earlier this year. Read more about Tattfoo's project here.

Victory Laundromat, 66 Victory Boulevard, Staten Island, NY
Directions by subway and ferry: Take R or 1 train to South Ferry. Take Staten Island Ferry to St. George Ferry Terminal and S48/62 to Montgomery Avenue

Congratulations go to 2010 Create Change Public Artist in Residence Tattfoo Tan for receiving the 28th Annual Award for Excellence in Design from the Public Design Commission of the City of New York for his graphic design work towards the rebranding and rehabilitation of the Bronx River Art Center (BRAC) building located in the West Farms neighborhood of the Bronx! Tattfoo received this award with Sage and Coombe Architects.

Applying his practice in permaculture design as seen in his Sustainable Organic Stewardship (S.O.S.) project, which is currently being developed during his residency at The Laundromat Project, Tattfoo created a pattern for the exterior of BRAC's building that simulates the growth of artistic and cultural roots.

Over the next two years, BRAC will undergo a $7 million renovation of its building including corporate identity and website redesign. In the interim, BRAC plans to fully maintain their programming and presence in the West Farms community. Click here to learn more about their programming.

To learn about Tattfoo's project first hand, join him this Saturday, July 24th at 10am for a bike tour of community gardens located on the North Shore of Staten Island. Meet at Victory Laundromat, 66 Victory Blvd., Staten Island, NY.

The month of May has been full of abundance! This Sunday we will host our first art workshop of the season at our partner laundromat, The Laundry Room located at 143 West 116th Street (btwn 6th + 7th Ave). Artist and LP Teaching Artist Shani Peters will lead a workshop in bookmaking from 12pm to 3pm. Workshops are free with a suggested donation of $4. If you can't make it, let your friends in the neighborhood know! Our full workshop schedule is below.

Also, The Laundromat Project is pleased to offer two limited-edition works by Mickalene Thomas and Rudy Shepherd, created especially to benefit our programs and projects. See below for more information.


Drop-in Art Workshop Schedule

Making Space for New Ideas
Bookmaking with Shani Peters
May 23, June 20, Aug 29, Sept 26

Solar Reconstruction
Solar printing a new neighborhood with Lady K-Fever
June 6, July 25, Aug 22

Take Back the T-Shirt
Creating and printing your own t-shirt design with Maya Valladares
June 13, July 18, Aug 8

Bling: Spices, Gold, and Precious Stones
Sidewalk drawing with ground spices with Brendan Carroll
June 27, Aug 1, Sept 19, Oct 3

Many Hands Make Light Work
Community Collograph with Rosemary Taylor
July 11, Aug 15, Sept 12, Oct 10


Collect Art and Support The Laundromat Project!

(L-R: Mickalene Thomas, Kalena 2010; Rudy Shepherd, Blacula 2009)
Each print in an edition of 20 is signed and numbered by the artists. The Thomas print also features hand-embellishments.

Mickalene Thomas
Kalena, 2010, 8 x 10 inches
Archival inkjet print and screenprint with hand-embellishments in glitter and acrylic medium
Signed and numbered, recto
Printed by Supreme Digital, New York
$1,000 (+ shipping & handling)

Rudy Shepherd
Blacula, 2009, 14 x 11 inches
Screenprint on paper
Signed and numbered, verso
Printed by Kayrock Screenprinting, New York$
250 (+ shipping & handling)

The proceeds from your purchase will ensure the continued success of The Laundromat Project’s mission to broaden access to art in our community and across New York. To purchase a print or for more information email: specialevent@laundromatproject.org


Create Change Alumni Are Busy!

Rudy Shepherd ('06): Rudy has a solo exhibition at Mixed Greens Gallery, (New York, NY) opening June 3rd, 2010. He was also recently hired as an Assistant Professor of Fine Art at the Pennsylvania State University’s School of Visual Arts.

Sarah Kolker('07): Sarah has relocated to Philadelphia with her 14 month old daughter Purple Ray and fiance Rolando Brown. She is currently working on a booklet for an elementary school science program and making jewelry to sell at art fairs. She will move to the Bay Area in California this August.

Shinique Smith ('07): Shinique had a recent solo exhibition titled Shinique Smith: No Words at Yvon Lambert (Paris, France). She has upcoming solo exhibitions at Miami Museum of Contemporary Art (opening September 2010), Southeastern Contemporary Center for the Arts in Winston-Salem (opening November 2010), and Madison Museum of Contemporary Art (opening January 2011).

Tracy Worley ('09): Tracy just launched the new website for her 2009 Create Change project The Dirty Laundry Line. Visit, listen, leave a message - http://www.thedirtylaundryline.com/

Michael Premo ('09): Michael has a solo exhibition of his project Housing is a Human Right (HHR) up at Jamaica Flux: Workspaces & Windows, a project of Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning (JCAL), and chashama Studios through June 5, 2010. Foreclosure clinics will be held on site at the 90-30 161st Street, 1st Fl, Jamaica, Queens. And…Help support Housing is a Human Right by bidding on some great gifts here. Auction closes May 21, 2010. Also, join Michael on Monday, May 24th at the Museum of the City of New York for the panel, "Artists' Housing - Past, Present, and Future." For reservations and information, call 212.534.1672, ext. 3395

Carlos Martinez ('09): Carlos is participating in the Queens Council on the Arts' Individual Artist Initiative.


Calling All Volunteers!
If you have a few hours a month to spare, please visit the ‘Employment Opportunities’ page on our website for more information on how you can help out with art workshops throughout the summer. We are especially looking to work with Spanish-English speakers. Stay tuned for Create Change public program announcements!

Thank you for circulating our Create Change Call for Proposals! We received really exciting applications, but as you know we were only able to select three projects. We are very happy to announce that Hanalei Ramos + Jiny Ung, Bayeté Ross Smith, and Tattfoo Tan were selected to be apart of this year's cohort.

(L-R: Jiny Ung + Hanalei Ramos, Bayeté Ross Smith, Tattfoo Tan)

Hanalei Ramos is a writer, performer, and community educator. Jiny Ung is a
mixed media artist with a background in political science, teaching, and fine arts.
As a duo, Hanalei and Jiny participated in Project Row Houses’ Artist Rounds
program where they installed “Intertwined” – a collaborative project that adapted
stories, images, and historical artifacts contributed by residents of Houston’s
Third Ward into a house-sized installation. For their Create Change project,
Ramos and Ung will create a documentary-style animated short based on the
oral histories of residents living in Jersey City, New Jersey and Woodside, Queens. [More]

Bayeté Ross Smith is an artist, photographer and arts educator whose work
explores identity, American youth and popular culture. For his Create Change
project, Bayeté will create a prototype for a larger public art project titled
Boombox as Community Music. Through workshops offered at his local
laundromat in Washington Heights, Ross Smith will work with his neighbors to
collect and record music and sound recordings that have personal significance
to them. For his larger project, musical contributions will be compiled into a
series of mashups that will broadcast from a tower of boomboxes installed in
an urban center. [More]

Tattfoo Tan is an artist and educator whose work seeks to find an immediate,
direct, and effective way of exploring issues related to the individual in society
through which to collapse the categories of ‘art’ and ‘life’ into one. Using his
Staten Island laundromat as a hub, Tattfoo will host a series of workshops
around creating a sustainable future through the cultivation of fresh produce. [More]

The Laundromat Project is accepting applications for the 2010 season.

We provide:

• A modest stipend
• A materials budget to complete your Create Change project.
• Professional development specific to creating public works
• Opportunity to meet with other area artists to brainstorm ideas about your project once every other week
• Projects will be featured on The Laundromat Project’s website
• Community celebration featuring your work at the end of the residency cycle

Eligibility:
Create Change is open to artists:
• who make socially engaged work
• live in the New York Metropolitan Area
• who are available to fully participate in residency activities between May and October 2010
• who work in any medium as long as they can adapt their creative practice to a site-specific project for their local laundromat
• who are not enrolled as a full-time student

Strong Create Change Candidates Have:
• Problem-solving skills, resourcefulness, and flexibility
• Demonstrated ability to carry out a project of this scale
• Deep respect for your neighbors, and the ability to collaborate with a broad public
• Willingness to take risks and step out of comfort zones
• Ability to actively engage non-artists in all aspects of your creative process

Criteria Used to Evaluate Applications:
• How is the project socially relevant to the community in which the artist lives?
• Is it clear how the artist will engage community members in this project? What aspects of this project include community interaction?
• Is this project feasible? Can the artist complete the project during the residency?
• Is the project unique to the laundromat setting? How does the project interact with the laundromat as a public space?

Key Program Dates:
March 1, 2010: Application Received

March 21, 2010: Interviews/Selection Event

April 1, 2010: Notifications sent

May 15 – October 31, 2010: Create Change residencies take place

Visit our Create Change Public Artist Residency program page for more info and frequently asked questions.