What about the Bed Stuy neighborhood that has felt like home for so many of us over the years? What can our future home look like? You are invited to share stories of what makes Bed Stuy home for Black people in a creative, open studio hosted by interdisciplinary artist and The Laundromat Project Create Change Artist-in-Residence, Kira Joy Williams. Black people have historically made homes in ways that absorb challenges and make something new from them. Bed Stuy is evidence of this as a hub of Black business, art, culture, homeownership, and more. In this gathering, Kira offers space and time to reflect on and record our varied experiences through art-making and storytelling. The art we create, and our hopes for the future of the community will be added to an archive Kira is building as part of the Home is in the Stories project – an archive for us, by us. Come ready to engage creatively with your neighbors! Materials will be provided, and attendance is free of charge.

Kira Joy Williams (she/they) is an artist and community builder based in Brooklyn, NY, on occupied Lenape land. Kira strives to contribute positively and generatively to an existing visual representation of Black people in the U.S. by creating archival materials in collaboration with the very people being represented. Through photographs and oral history, Kira’s art explores notions of diaspora, home, care, and community. Her photographs and recorded histories, including her latest project, Home is in the Stories, exist in the wake of longstanding memory-work traditions that use the past to make sense of the present and construct a new future – one in which we all belong. Find out more about the artist at kirajoywilliams.com.