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Drawing inspiration from the role potlucks have played within queer Asian American social justice groups as a site of connection, Nourishing Power offers an array of takeaway tools for gathering (prompts, objects, recipes for action, questions) that audiences can carry into the world and enact. Like a potluck, these tools will encourage people to bring something to share with their gatherings to sustain and nourish interconnectivity and empathy. This work is a collaborative piece by Visibility Project (Mia Nakano) and Related Tactics (Michele Carlson, Weston Teruya, and Nate Watson).
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Image by Related Tactics
Image by Nordlys Photography
Image by Nordlys Photography
Image by Related Tactics
Image by Nordlys Photography
Image by Nordlys Photography
About the Artists:
Mia Nakano, from Visibility Project, is an artist, archivist, social change maker rooted in Oakland, CA. Her work is shaped through her experiences as a proud 4th generation Japanese American, queer woman of color, daughter of a single mother, and sister of a deaf adult. She is a self-taught artist, who advocates the strategic and ethical use of the arts to make social change. Nakano is the Founding Director of the Visibility Project and Co-founding Director of the Resilience Archives. She is a board member of Banteay Srei, whose work is dedicated to ending the sexual exploitation of young Southeast Asian women in Oakland. She is the IT Director of the Asian American for Civil Rights and Equality (AACRE) network, and co-founder of Hyphen magazine. Nakano has dedicated the last two decades of her life to uplifting the stories and histories of LGBTQ Asian Pacific Americans. She has contributed work to Colorlines, the Kathmandu Post, Democracy Now! the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Institute, Salon.com, APEX Express, Intersection for the Arts, and de Young.
Related Tactics (Michele Carlson, Weston Teruya, and Nate Watson) is a multidisciplinary collective of artists of color creating work together at the intersection of race and culture. Formed in 2015, Related Tactics projects utilize a variety of modes— sculpture, writing, print, and social engagement, and curatorial tactics—to explore the connections between art, movements for equity & justice, and the public. We create opportunities to gather, amplify, and connect a multiplicity of voices in our work that draws upon community-facing, site-specific research to invite reflection, social action, and envision a more just society.
They have produced projects with Corning Museum of Glass, USF Thacher Gallery, Berkeley Art Center, Museum of Capitalism, Southern Exposure, Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, and ICA San Jose. We have been supported through a Rainin Arts Fellowship, Kala’s Print Public, a CoLAB residency project with Montalvo Arts Center, a residency at The Luminary, and grants from Ruth Foundation for the Arts and Craft Research Fund. Our creative publication, Shelf Life, was published by Sming Sming Books and our writing has been featured in the Brooklyn Rail and The Hopkins Review.
