Rashin Fahandej
Summer 2018 Public Artist Resident
A Father’s Lullaby multi-platform sound installation on BCA Public Plaza
July 28–October 26, 2018
Opening Reception: Saturday, July 28, 6–9 pm

Rashin Fahandej will use the BCA Summer Public Artist Residency to further develop her multi-platform project A Father’s Lullaby, to consider the absence of fathers in communities of color as a direct result of mass incarceration, its life-long impact on children who are left behind and its weight on women and lower-income families, explored through the space of love and intimacy. The project is being developed with community members as creative collaborators, if you would like to contribute your voice to this project, please visit fatherslullaby.org or email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it to set up an interview. It was initially launched in 2016–2017, when Fahandej served as Artist in Residence with the City of Boston, and has also been developed in connection with her role as Research Fellow at MIT Open Documentary Lab since 2016.

Rashin Fahandej, A Father’s Lullaby, Variation I, Video Projection and Multi channel Sound, Data visualized graph, TVs and stereo sound Exhibition at Villa Victoria Center for the Arts

Fahandej’s project for BCA will be realized in partnership with multiple organizations including the newly formed Office of Returning Citizens in Boston, an agency supporting individuals who return to Boston after being released from state, federal and county facilities, as well as others who were previously incarcerated. She will work with BCA to develop a public, multi-channel site-specific sound installation of lullabies utilizing the trees and garden on BCA’s public plaza. The work will be created through a community-engaged process including workshops with formerly incarcerated men and other fathers in our community.

Selected Media Coverage

A Jarring Lullaby | By Matt Martinelli | July 20, 2018 | The Improper Boston

Featured in The Ticket | August 3, 2018 | The Boston Globe

Woomin Kim
Fall 2018 Visual Artist Resident
September 10–December 21, 2018

Woomin Kim creates landscapes of urban anthropology using donated objects from local residents. Her recent projects have included building a large scale loom and using it to weave together locally collected objects, and weaving jewelry from antique stores with wool, both indicative of her interest in our interactions with the objects, materials and products that make up contemporary material culture.

Woomin Kim, Urban Nest: Greater Boston woods, found fibers from Greater Boston area, 2017

At BCA, Kim plans to develop a new installation that will involve building several freestanding frames based on the structure of the tapestry loom. After collecting sweaters from members of the community, she will unravel the threads and tie the strings vertically to the frame as warps. She will then collect old jewelry, fabric and small accessories from local individuals, and weave them into the frame as well. The finished fabrics will stay mounted in the original frame like standing banners containing abstract images made from various materials and fabrics.

Kim proposes two public programs connected with the residency. One will be “Unraveling Sweater Day” and the other will be “Tying Objects Day.” On “Unraveling Sweater Day,” participants will be invited to bring old sweaters to BCA and work together to unravel them into bundles of yarn. Each sweater, unraveled yarn and story of the sweater will be documented and included in the project archive. The yarn will be tied vertically on the frame. On “Tying Objects Day,” the artist will install strings in a public setting, and participants will be invited to hang objects of their choice on the string. When the strings are packed with small objects, they will be used as wefts for the final weaving.

Kim Smith
Winter/Spring 2019 Visual Artist Resident
January 28–May 10, 2019

During her BCA residency, Kim Smith will draw on the art concept of dérive, a strategy put forward by Paris-based artist Guy Debord in the mid-20th century, in which individuals are encouraged to operate without the usual routines and motives in order to allow the present moment of the city to guide interaction. Smith proposes to revisit these concepts in the contemporary context, using the neighborhood of the South End in Boston as her base. Building on the ideas of dérive and psychogeography, and working directly with neighborhood participants through walks and map-making workshops, she will create new modes and forms of cartography, specific to our environs and community. Participants will create their own cartographic artifacts documenting their personal experiences of time and space.

Kim Smith, Mockup of foldout printed map, created from personal geographies and stories of the area; distributed as a tourist map on the street.

The process-based, multidisciplinary and multimedia work will rely heavily on continuous engagement with the place, the people and the community, and may emerge as drawing, visual maps, sound art, books, installation and whatever else. Public interactions will include printing and distributing copies of fold-out maps based on psychogeographical interpretations of the South End, created with and by local residents.