Poetry in the Courtyard

Under the hot July sun in the courtyard at MoMA PS1 on Rashid Johnson’s Stage, five artists, activists, and poets shared their poetry about the politics of space as part of the Life Between Buildings exhibition. Life Between Buildings reviews how artists and communities have used interstitial, negative spaces in NYC as spaces for life through community gardens and art installations. The organizers of the event, Assistant Curators Jody Graf and Elena Ketelsen Gonzalez noted that the courtyard was chosen intentionally to “breathe life” into what used to be a parking lot, now an open space surrounded by luxury condos.

Lillian Tate, a 2021 participant in the MoMA PS1 and Lower East Side Girls club internship program, spoke of what freedom is not and painted an abolitionist’s world as green. Urayoàn Noel, author, translator and Associate Professor at NYU, performed haikus written on plastic bags about the regulation of space, using English and Spanish interchangeably. Jayden Strong, an interdisciplinary artist, invited listeners to take action, “Where is the dynamite?” Ei…