CALL CONNECTS - June 2025
Entre El Aire y El Agua Workshop
This past Saturday, June 28th, Niceli Portugal held two art-making workshops at the Corona Library. During the workshops, participants worked on an interactive flood map, banners, posters, costumes, and more to use in a ceremony procession at Flushing Meadows Corona Park. The procession, Entre El Aire y El Agua: Water Parade - Flushing Meadows, will take place Saturday, July 19th. Stay tuned for more information!
This workshop is part of a multidisciplinary art initiative responding to the phenomenon of cloudbursts; a sudden, intense rainfall event impacting Corona. This project seeks to deepen residents' personal and collective connection to water as a source of life, migration, memory, danger, and renewal. It explores water not only as environmental concern, but as an emotional, ancestral, and cultural presence in their lives.
Niceli Portugal is a multidisciplinary artist and educator from the Peruvian Andes whose work addresses immigration and sustainability. CALL is thrilled to partner with her this summer for our Cloudburst / WaterWays!
Graham Foundation
We are thrilled to announce that Mary Miss is a 2025 recipient of a Graham Foundation Award to Individuals for the publication of her forthcoming book --- City as Living Laboratory: Artists + Scientists + Communities Creating a Resilient and Equitable Public Realm, ORO Editions, 2026. In the book, Mary Miss presents a transformative model for the sustainable development of urban communities impacted by climate change, crumbling infrastructure, and neighborhood disinvestment. The book chronicles Miss’s efforts since the 1970s to expand artistic projects beyond the walls of art museums and into initiatives that engage diverse stakeholders in addressing complex issues at the scale of the city.
Founded in 1956, the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts fosters the development and exchange of diverse and challenging ideas about architecture and its role in the arts, culture, and society.
CALL is Proud to Announce Our 2025 Joseph Robert Foundation Grant!
Many thanks to the Joseph Robert Foundation for their enduring support and excitement about the Cloudburst Project. You can read more about their mission below.
A CALL FOR THE FUTURE:
Several weeks ago now CALL was hit with the abrupt termination of our grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). This has meant an immediate loss of nearly $250,000. We appealed and won back some of these funds, but are left with a daunting gap.
CALL's loss of funding weakens and may break the chain of connection, knowledge, and creative ingenuity that makes our work meaningful and impactful. With this year's funding terminated, our 2026 funding will also be in jeopardy. But we do not believe the answer is to turn away. With your help, we can make a new pathway and territory for CALL, and for the communities we work with. We must mobilize our collaborators and supporters to proceed with this vital work.
An important first step has been made: we are pleased to announce that Agnes Gund has made a $50,000 Leadership Gift for this year and another for the following year. Our urgent goal is to raise $50,000 to match this year's donation by the end of August. There are still a few days left to give!
You can help us bridge this gap and ensure our work continues to thrive and fulfill our commitments to the communities where we are currently focused --- Milwaukee; the Bronx; and Corona, Queens. We have pioneering work planned to start this summer in Corona with two gifted artists: Niceli Portugal and Emilio Martinez Poppe. The artists will engage the community around growing risks of cloudbursts (increasingly hazardous rainfalls).
We remain determined in the face of these capricious cancellations because we know there is so much more to be done, especially in the face of a warming planet.
We hope you will be part of the future with us.
Your efforts help ensure that CALL is able to continue to use the power of art and science to promote understanding of critical environmental challenges in local communities and spur action for sustainable solutions!
Grab a copy of the Pedestrian Observations map!
The Pedestrian Observations: Mapping Manhattan Chinatown's Public Realm pocket-sized resource map are still available!
In this pamphlet, you'll find an illustrated map by artists and designers Myles Zhang and Stephan Fan, along with extensive information and questions about the uses of public and private space.
We're more than happy to send a copy your way, just fill out the form through the button below.