Other Worlds
Sunday, July 10 2016
12:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Other Worlds features traveling, creative and community-driven collections of books made accessible within the Jameco Exchange exhibition, on 165th Street and in public spaces in the neighborhood. A pop-up bookstore, non-lending portable mini libraries, and books in public spaces are available for purchase, browsing, borrowing or passing on.
The Filipino American Library based in Queens, NY, is a moveable non-lending library that celebrates the creation and appreciation of Filipino/a narratives by writers, poets, artists, and scholars across the diaspora. The library centers the local and global Filipino/a voice through the sharing of literature in public spaces. The Filipino American Library is spearheaded by PJ Gubatina Policarpio, a community arts engager, socially-engaged artist, curator, programmer, and educator. His multidisciplinary practice utilizes research, archive, collaboration, curatorial, education and public engagement as art and tool. Born in the Philippines and raised in San Francisco, PJ is currently based in Corona, Queens.
J. Expressions is a debut pop-up bookstore project by Sherese Francis, whose mission is to promote local authors and writers in Queens, specifically in the Jamaica, Southeast and South Central Queens areas. There are surprisingly few independent bookstores in Queens, which act as community spaces and support cultural exchange and the discovery of local talent. J. Expressions fosters awareness of the need for bookstores, and serves to celebrate and showcase some of the independent authors and writers of diverse backgrounds who live in Queens. Sherese Francis is a Queens-based published poet, writer and blogger of Futuristically Ancient, where she writes about the arts and cultures of the African Diaspora through an afro-futurist lens. She is also the literary director of the Queens Book Festival. In addition to her blog and the festival, Sherese is working on a few other projects, including a fantasy novel called The E, based in Queens; the self-published chapbook Lucy's Scroll-Bones; and a longer poetry manuscript.
The International Public Space Library (IPSL), launched in 2010 by MomenTech, offers free books in public spaces around the world. IPSL books are meant to be found by passersby in public places: some might be found on park benches, and others might be located under trees. Anyone can donate or borrow a book. The only request is for borrowers to leave the book in any public space when they are done with it, so that someone else may find it. Because of the nature of IPSL, the exact locations and titles of the books in its collection are unknown. To donate a book or learn more about IPSL, visit the IPSL website. MomenTech is a New York-based experimental production studio collaboration of artists Mika Johnson, Reynard Loki and Maciej Toporowicz.
1/1/1994 is a comprehensive collection of books and media that could be relevant to the construction of another culture, and alternate worlds. The library has been slowly and steadily growing over the past two decades, with books stored in physical locations in New York City, and in Rosarito, Tecámac, Tecate, Tijuana and Tultitlán, Mexico. Several attempts to centralize the collection have been made, including the construction of a physical space in Baja California. 1/1/94 covers a wide range of topics including: agriculture, art, economics and finance, games, electronic media, indigenous cultures of Central and North America and Greenland, education, labor, literature, narrative media, performance, philosophy, social movements, social utopias, and more. 1/1/94 is a project by Diego De La Vega Coffe Co-op (Gabriela Ceja and Fran Ilich) and is located at Café Patolli inside the exhbition Jameco Exchange.
Related Exhibition: Jameco Exchange