Dreamseeds is an art and sound installation and workshop series, a space to honor our visions for the future. The launch of the ongoing project was on view at Gallery CA in Baltimore, MD from October 21, 2022-November 18, 2022. Co-created by Sanahara Ama Chandra and Hannah Brancato, we started from a place of understanding that, from all of our individual and collective experiences ranging from our points of pain to our points of bliss, we have inside of us sparks of ideas that are the seeds with which we can co-create a new world.
Created and composed by Sanahara Ama Chandra. You can listen to the sound portraits here. Featuring voices and stories from interviewees and workshop participants, during workshops were co-led by Hannah Brancato + Sanahara Ama Chandra. Playing throughout this installation are a series of sound portraits created and composed by Sanahara Ama Chandra. Her lyrics and musical responses, played on crystal bowls, were improvised in response to hearing the reflections and hopes for the future brought forth by the original 5 interviewees, as well as the group conversations in a series of 6 public workshops. “Journey to Dreamseeds” workshops took place between June-October 2022 and were open to the public. The original 5 interviews with Ignacio Rivera, Nuala Cabral, Alexis Flanagan, Jadelynn St Dre, and Ama Chandra, were recorded in 2021. An introduction by Hannah Brancato was recorded in 2022.
Leading up to the exhibition, Ama and I organized a series of community workshops to discuss transformation and create visions for the future. Two of these workshops were with seniors at J Van Story Branch apartments in Station North. Some of the participants in the workshop are pictured here, at the opening event.
Created by Hannah Brancato Portraits featuring Ignacio Rivera, Nuala Cabral, Alexis Flanagan, Jadelynn St Dre, Sanahra Ama Chandra, and Hannah Brancato These tapestries are portraits of Ignacio Rivera, Nuala Cabral, Alexis Flanagan, Jadelynn St Dre, Sanahara Ama Chandra, and Hannah Brancato. Each quilt features a quote from that individual’s interview, as a wish and a piece of advice for anyone working for a more just future. The fabric was made by creating cyanotype prints using each interviewee’s hair. Cyanotype is a photographic printing process in which a chemical reacts to UV light, resulting in the deep blue that you see here. Any photo-negative or object remains white (in the case of these cyanotypes, the hair is white). The process was originally used to reproduce blueprints. These quilts are a meditation on how the experiences of people engaged in activism results in deep wisdom that is held in our bodies; and it is an exploration of how this wisdom might serve as a blueprint for how to do social justice work in a more sustainable and visionary way.
This paper was created by workshop participants, and by Hannah Brancato, Sanahara Ama Chandra and Kendra Hebel. The question was co-written by Hannah and Ama, and the installation was designed by Hannah. In our dreamseeds workshops and throughout this exhibition, we make paper as a way of composting the old into the new. Made from ground up pieces of writing from from dozens of people, reflecting on things from the past that need to be transformed, this handmade, recycled paper is a physical representation of the ways that we can and must work with our histories, to create a new future. Visitors were invited to write or draw their own response, to add to the weaving.
Conversations with Ignacio Rivera, Nuala Cabral, Alexis Flanagan, Jadelynn St Dre, Ama Chandra, and Hannah Brancato, organized by Hannah Brancato. Move Slowly is an interview series and visual art project featuring conversations between creative activists working to end sexual violence, about the toll activism can take on our bodies, relationships, hearts and minds, and how to create visionary and supportive communities of care. Each interview is paired with a portrait of the interviewee, based on their words and cyanotype prints of their hair (as you can see in the center of the gallery). In seeking insights about the relationship between movement building and self-preservation, these interviews brought Hannah Brancato and Sanahara Ama Chandra together to cultivate space for generating new dreams for a more just future.
co-written and designed by Hannah Brancato and Sanahara Ama Chandra. These statements describe the values that guide this exhibition and project, and the impact visions for the future can have on the world. In each statement, there is an inherent connection between the self and the systems we exist within. Both require investigation and re-imagining for a more equitable future. As Grace Lee Boggs’ said: “We must transform ourselves to transform the world.” The imagery of the dandelion seed underscores our focus on regeneration, and the Visitors were invited to add their own beliefs about the power of dreaming in shaping change, responding on a blue circle post-it.