WS2MS: Bringing the Message Home [Short Version]

FOR IMMMEDIATE RELEASE:
DATE:  February 24, 2012

CONTACTS:
Fawn Potash, Director, Masters on Main Street project, 518-943-3400, 518-929-5764, fawn@greenearts.org
Paul McLean, Occupy With Art, Co-Curator, artforhumans@gmail.com


Wall Street to Main Street
Bringing the Message Home

Masters on Main Street is hosting a dynamic art project linking Occupy Wall Street and the world, via the small town of Catskill, NY. Main Street’s vacant storefronts come alive with over 50 visual art and design exhibits, performances, workshops and panel discussions from the opening date on March 17 through May 31st.  Visit opening day exhibits on Saturday, March 17 from 2-5 and party at BRIK Gallery, 473 Main Street from 5-8.

Wall Street to Main Street is a collaborative presentation working with individual artists, curators and organizers from Occupy with Art, an affinity group of the Occupy Wall Street Arts and Culture Working Group.  The Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement has focused its energy on justice for the 99%.   Wall Street to Main Street, a project facilitated by Occupy With Art,  offers a platform for creative expression and dialogue focusing attention on a struggling community through a ten-week festival of experiences designed to engage, educate and inspire. 

The Arts and Culture Committee of Occupy Wall Street believes that art is not a luxury item. It is a commonwealth that belongs not just to the 1%, but to all of us. Art-making is not privileged to so-called talent or relegated to extracurricular activity-- it is a universal language that is essential to human growth, learning, happiness, and sustainability.

The occupation itself is art, birthed from a set of values and principles that activate creative, independent, and critical thought. Together, we aim to inspire and empower the 99%, expose specific economic injustices, and envision the alternative future we are building.
- The Arts and Culture Committee

Following on the heels of the ‘Arab Spring’ and European protests, a wave of Occupy Wall Street movements have swept across the United States, with encampments in major cities like Boston, Philadelphia, Washington DC and Chicago as well as locally in Hudson, Poughkeepsie and Albany.  These grassroots movements bring attention to ‘Main Street’ issues that affect everyone- jobs, housing, education and health care as well as shining a light on the need for financial industry reform, corporate responsibility, constitutional rights and sustainable solutions to energy and resource use. 
Wall Street to Main Street highlights the vanguard role of artists in the OWS and protest movements historically. Start your tour of Wall Street to Main Street at BRIK Gallery (473 Main St.) with the immersive introductory exhibit created by the Alternative Museum. The show provides a visual and historical context for the OWS movement showing how one movement builds on the concerns and success of the last. 

Other group exhibits can be found down Main Street  along with Faces of the Occupiers, The Buckminster Fuller Institute’s Sustainable Solutions exhibits, The Sarah Barker Studio, Occupy Books, an interactive study Center and many storefront window installations.

There are dozens of free events, workshops, concerts, and forums. A few highlights include Canadian graffiti artist Joel Richardson's outdoor stenciling workshop using Richardson’s collection of copyright free images and symbols; Salt Lake City artist Jorge Rojas’ Low Lives Occupy!, a  recorded series of choreography, music and artists’ performances projected at night;  an augmented reality app for smart phones and tablets, enabling you to view an opening day guided tour of Main Street developed by Mark Skwarek’s NYU students; The Buckminster Fuller Institute’s forum on alternative economies and another on the shared land/water resources connecting upstate and downstate New York;  Michael Harris’, Awakening the Dreamer/Changing the Dream symposium encouraging an environmentally sustainable, spiritually fulfilling, socially just human presence on the planet. 

ABOUT THE CO-ORGANIZERS: Imani Brown, Paul McLean, Kate Menconeri, Arthur Polendo, Fawn Potash, Geno Rodriguez, Paul Smart, Sam Truitt, Boo Lynn Walsh and Jacqueline Weaver.

For more information on Occupy with Art and Arts and Culture, please visit artsandculture.nycga.net, occupywithart.com, occupymuseums.org, artsandlabor.org.

Hudson Valley residents and visitors to Wall Street to Main Street are invited to contribute artwork for an evolving exhibit that showcases the diverse art, artifacts and ephemera that we collectively treasure in a temporary museum called The People’s Collection.  Pick up your invitation at exhibit locations or online at www.greenearts.org.

Please visit our website www.greenearts.org for a detailed map and calendar of events.