The Sidewalk Online Artist residency commissions artists to explore their practice as it relates to current events and the psychological and spatial implications of such events. This online residency will take the shape of daily movement classes, responsive performances, artists talks and gatherings. Sidewalk Detroit is dedicated to uplifting the voices of Detroit artists, while celebrating Detroit landscape and culture through deep engagement and thoughtful curation. During this time of physical distance, we strive to push our practice of engagement with artists into new territory, exploring the complexities of human interaction, and meaningful connection when movement, and livelihoods stand in precarious places.
Kerrie Trahan first attended a yoga class in 2005, at the Boll Family YMCA in her hometown Detroit, Michigan. Trahan practiced yoga every now and then until she moved to Yeosu, South Korea where she began to take yoga seriously. Practicing yoga helped her overcome the anxiety, homesickness and culture shock. These emotions surfaced as a result of moving to a far away and unfamiliar place as well as the depression and grief she was holding on to due to the sudden loss of her father in 2006. In June 2012, Trahan earned her RYT-200 (Registered Yoga Teacher-200-hour Certification) and soon after founded Yoganic Flow in order to share it with people in her community. For more information visit Yoganic Flow.
Healing Hatha Yoga with KerriE TRAhan
This all-levels yoga class concentrates on healing the entire body and mind with asanas (yoga postures), pranayama (breathing exercises) and dhyana (meditation). Each day of class a part of the body or aspect of the mind that may be in need or healing, recovery or restoration will be focused on to develop both strength and relaxation.
Follow along with Kerrie:
Thursday, April 9th - May 8, 8 am
Billy Mark is an experimental artist whose work is rooted in the art of poetic freestyle. Based in poetry, his work extends to areas of music, theater, sculpture, movement and installation. A graduate of the California Institute of the Arts, his writing has been published in The Guidebook of Alternative Nows and SEEN magazine. His work has been performed at REDCAT (Los Angeles), Spiel Festival (Austria), Detroit Contemporary, and Bushwick Open Studios (New York). For more information visit Billy Mark.
OTHER GEOGRAPHIES WITH BILLY MARK:
In a time of limited physical mobility, Billy Mark wrestles with other spatial relations:
How can someone be so close and so far away?
How can someone so far away be so close?
What are the spatial relations of spirit?
What does a spiritual geography look like?
Follow along with Billy:
Tuesday, April 14th, 7pm
Interview + Freestyle Solitude video
Wednesday, April 15th, 7pm
Performance: Marriage is Hard
Thursday, April 16th, 7pm
Performance: Rock Video
Text: Tutu Forgiveness
Friday, April 17th, 7pm
Performance: 20 Minutes video
Class: Exercise video
Saturday, April 18th:
Artist Talk + Feedback Session
Ajara Alghali is a Detroit native by birth but a self-proclaimed global citizen. Ajara developed a love of culture at an early age. By blending life experiences through traditional and contemporary music and dance in her style, her work focuses on the connection between African people globally and on the continent. She is a performance artist that has trained over 12 years in traditional West African dance. Ajara is also a budding film-maker exploring the themes of Black identity and African relationships. For more information visit TeMate African Dance Arts.
Let’s Dance! An Introduction to West African Dance and Movement w/Ajara Alghali
Join TeMaTe Institute for Black Dance and Culture for an exciting two-week introduction to the art of West African Dance! We will be learning, reflecting, and sharing together in order to bridge physical distance and create healing psychic space in these trying times. Let’s be together. Let's Dance together.
FOLLOW ALONG WITH TEMATE AFRICAN DANCE ARTS
Shazia Diddiqi is a Board Certified Art Therapist, Licensed Professional Counselor, and founder/owner of Let’s Art About It. She graduated from WSU with a duel Master of Arts degree in Art Therapy and Clinical Mental Health Counseling in 2011, and in her past experience includes both inpatient and outpatient individual and group counseling and art therapy work with Common Ground, Wolverine Human Services, Southfield Human Serviced, Samaritan Counseling Center of Southeast Michigan, Sound Counseling, Macomb County Juvenile Justice Center and Juvenile Court, Beaumont Hospital Royal Oak, WSU Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences, and Affirmations LGBT+ Center in Ferndale who awarded her their Ally of the Year in 2018. For more information visit Let’s Art About It.
Resilience: Continuing Our Creative Practice in Times of Hardship
How might artists nurture their creative practice and careers in the face of quarantine, grief and profound change? This group is about sharing strategies and best practices for continuing your work as in artist within the constraints and challenges that we face due to Covid-19. Sidewalk Detroit is partnering with licensed Art Therapist, Shazia Siddiqi, MA, ATR-BC, LPC to facilitate work with this group.
FOLLOW ALONG WITH THE GROUP
Monday, April 20th, 6pm
Week 1: Creating a safe place/sense of safety
Monday, May 4th, 6pm
Week 2: Balancing emotions
Monday, May 18th, 6pm
Week 3: Coping with change and transitions
Monday, June 1st, 6pm
Week 4: Renewing your vision
THE HINTERLANDS is a Detroit-based company creating performances and public events that are highly irrational and deeply American. From our original touring pieces to the events we curate in our Detroit neighborhood, our work is built around pressing into the unknown areas of our personal and collective history with fearless physicality and a sense of humor. Our performances smash seemingly disparate images and ideas together, culminating in new, highly layered meanings that are greater than the sum of their parts. We create a space for our audience to be in this unknown hinterland with us through techniques that disarm and disorient, short-circuiting expectations and luring them into unexpected interactions. For more information visit The Hinterlands.
Supercoolwicked is a freedom-focused musician who also finds joy as an actor, dancer, and teaching artist. Her layered identities have manifested into various art forms in diverse spaces ranging from opening up for Jack White at the Detroit Bernie Sanders rally, a feature in the Dazed, Carhartt WIP, and Motown documentary “Showing Up Showing Out”, the original play, “Cleopatra Boy”, presented by the theater troupe A Host of People, and gracing the cover of the “2020 Bands to Watch” edition of The Detroit Metro Times. She is a proud Artist in Residence at Assemble Sound and Poetic Societies.
Yvette Rock received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Cooper Union in New York City and a Master of Fine Arts in painting from University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. She spent one year as a Visiting Scholar during her post-graduate stint at U of M. It was during this time that Rock conceived of Detroit Connections, a program that fostered collaboration between U of M and Detroit schools and organizations. She has worked as artist-in-residence with InsideOut Literary Arts Project, founded a local after-school program, is a community activist, and collaborates with artists of various disciplines. Rock has exhibited throughout southeast Michigan, including the Carr Center, Detroit Artists Market, Birmingham Bloomfield Art Center, Ellen Kayrod Gallery, and National Conference of Artists. She is the founder and CEO of Live Coal Gallery, a social venture whose purpose is to foster a passion for art, community, and learning. In 2018, she opened The RED, a children's art museum in Detroit. Live Coal is a 2017 and 2019 Knight Arts Challenge winner. Rock is a 2019 Facing Change: Documenting Detroit fellow. She lives in Detroit with her husband and four children.
OPENING SINGING WITH THE HINTERLANDS, FEATURING KESSWA
Open Singing is a regular, open gathering of singers of all ages and abilities, normally hosted at by The Hinterlands at Play House. This special event is an online experiment featuring the Hinterlands, with guest artist KESSWA, hosted by Sidewalk Detroit. During each open singing session participants sing a selection of songs drawn from a variety of singing traditions. Sessions are drop-in with no further commitment.
FOLLOW ALONG WITH THE HINTERLANDS + KESSWA
Tuesday, April 21st, 7pm
KESIENA WANGHO, aka KESSWA, is a multimedia performing artist from Detroit, Michigan. Through her work as a vocalist, producer, and vinyl enthusiast, she creates performances that integrate sound and light through music and mantra. Her most recent performance, KESSWA UNLIMITED, blends afro-surrealist visuals and the sonic elements of her debut EP, Soften.
High Gloss Heartspace Radio
High Gloss Heartspace Radio is a live interactive audio-visual heart-healing experiment hosted by Supercoolwicked. This radio program seeks to open, balance, and heal the heart chakra by finding softness and malleability within the center.
The audience calls into the station with whatever their heart is carrying and your radio host, Supercoolwicked will prescribe and perform a song to that feeling. To enhance this journey toward center softness, Supercoolwicked will employ the use of healing crystal quartz sound bowls, physical exercises, short recorded meditations, and breathing exercises.
FOLLOW ALONG WITH SUPERCOOLWICKED
Friday, April 24th, 5:30pm
Tuesday, May 12th, 8:30pm
Thursday, May 14th, 8:30pm
Friday, May 15th, 8:30pm
Observing Nature • Connecting with Nature • Imitating Nature
There are tens of thousands of observations we can make on a daily basis. These observations give us insight and understanding about the world around us. The phenomenon of the physical world we call nature is filled with an abundance of beauty and mystery. From the invisible wind whose effects we feel when we walk to the sounds of birds calling one another – nature invites us to observe it, connect with it, and imitate it.
In this online residency, multi-disciplinary artist Yvette Rock will share about her journey exploring the world of nature through a multi-year installation called “Nest” while inviting you to consider embarking on your own ongoing creative projects using found objects and common household materials.
FOLLOW ALONG WITH YVETTE ROCK
Monday, May 4th, 7pm
Artist Interview
Art Classes:
Tuesday, May 5th, 3pm
The Nest
Thursday, May 7th, 3pm
Lessons from the Weaver Bird
Friday, May 8th, 3pm
You can rest
Upcoming Events
