Find your Place: Community Celebration

“If you take away the culture, the art has no meaning. Art has to come out of the community.” - Romare Bearden

An art exhibit, if it is going to have the impact it ought to – to transform the way people think and interact with the world – must also be a community space. On Sunday, June 22nd, the Black Mythology Project invites you to the Find Your Place Community Celebration and experience the art exhibit reimagined.

ESC is hosting a Clothing Swap & Shop featuring Black stylists, designers, and vintage stores displaying carefully curated racks of clothes and jewelry. This marketplace is full of surprises: buy, barter, and exchange the clothes you bring with vendors and other neighbors in the space. Clean out your closet for a cause! All left-over clothes will be donated to Open Table Nashville to support Nashville residents who recently had their homes bulldozed during a homeless sweep in early June. The Clothing Swap & Shop is from 3 - 7 PM.

Michael Moloi and Friends have prepared an immersive live performance, the likes of which you have never seen. A visual artist, dancer, and musician, Michael was born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa and is trained in disciplines including gumboots, pantsula and traditional Zulu dance. Join in the dance! The audience is invited to participate in a call and response. Rhythm is optional. Enthusiasm is required. Michael Moloi and Friends performance is from 4:30 - 5:30 PM.

Kenieha Rae has organized a Write & Release workshop that invites every participant to be a part of the space and transforms visual art into lyric. Add your story to the exhibit! The night will conclude with the community transform individual reflections into a collage poem that will be displayed in the exhibit space. The Write & Release workshop is from 5:30 - 7 PM.

20% of all Door Sales and Drink Purchases go to Open Table Nashville, a local non-profit with the mission to end homelessness and create a more equitable Nashville with affordable housing for all. Open Table Nashville is on the front lines in a state in which homelessness is prosecuted as a felony. In Tennessee, a felony means that you are banned from voting, public housing, and employment protections. This is the enduring reverberation of slavery: we have created a class of people legally excluded from the rights of citizenship. Create a history we can be proud of! We are proud to stand in solidarity with these street outreach workers, policy leaders, democracy defenders and all of our friends living on the street.