“Looking at these films and the oeuvre they attest to, we find time and again the same desire to uncover powerful contemporary strategies, writes curator Caroline Ferreira on Elizabeth Orr’s work, “...shot in 2021 in the middle of a global pandemic, (Mind Gamed) immediately evokes that other invisible monster which has taken over the planet since the beginning of 2020 — that other foreign body which has come to contaminate healthy bodies.”

Activist and writer Andrea Nikté Juarez Mendoza responds to Tanika Williams’ Sanctuary: “I have your eyes / So in the mirror I stand / And I see you looking back at me / Your love is in the schoolbooks / And the good cooked food / I felt your embrace in the warmth of new blankets / And heard your footsteps as I walked in shoes you sent to me / I have seen you in all the ways / one sees without eyes / Knowing you have loved me in all the ways one loves without touch/ Together / we filled the gaps.”

The recent surge in hate crimes against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders is rooted in the systemic normalization of nationalism and xenophobia that seeks to destroy our vision of a better world. At BRIC, we celebrate our beloved community of artists, creators, teachers, neighbors and friends. We believe we are enriched by the diversity of this community and will raise our voice against those that believe otherwise.

Kambui Olujimi is a multidisciplinary artist who grew up in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood in Brooklyn. His work has included large-scale sculpture, painting, installation, photography, video, and performance. Olujimi is equally influenced by and often combines such abstract, scientific realms as cosmology, multiverses, physics, and quantum forces with the intimacy of mundane objects like vernacular photographs and hand-me down furniture.