2023 Fall Civic Arts Workshop Series Recap
In November, Sweet Water Foundation launched the Fall 2023 Civic Arts Workshop Series in SWF’s Civic Arts Church, featuring four local artists: Ricardia Davis, Rhonda Long, Dr. Derise “Mama Afua” Tolliver, and Darlene Grant. Each event began with an artist talk highlighting their personal journeys and the histories of their artistic practices and mediums, followed by a workshop in which artists shared their practices with the SWF team and community. We invite you to learn more about the workshop series.
What is Civic Arts?
Sweet Water Foundation practices Civic Arts, an artistic practice that intentionally integrates art and culture into public spaces. Civic Arts uses affordable, accessible, and aesthetic materials and mediums connected to and abundant within our urban ecology to weave artistic expression into the fabric of the community with an ethos of transforming ‘wastes’ into resources. The practice of Civic Arts goes beyond typical “social practice” and “public art,” which offer symbolic and, oftentimes, short-term gestures that highlight issues (of social justice, equity, and the like) but rarely move beyond insular conversations with limited action toward structural change. In contrast, Civic Arts engages all members of a community - not just those who identify themselves as “artists” - to cultivate and catalyze meaningful change in the built environment and the social fabric of the community.
SWF’s Civic Arts Church (CAC) was re-generated to provide a space for artists of all mediums to create, explore, teach, learn, and share. Within the space, local artists, who are far too often overlooked, are uplifted and their works showcased. Since 2020, the CAC has hosted dozens of field trips, Civic Arts Friday’s workshops, performances, and tours - welcoming people from around the globe to see featured artists' work.
In Fall 2023, SWF launched the inaugural Civic Arts Workshop Series, welcoming four local artists to lead workshops. The workshops elevated artists who are often overlooked, challenging traditional notions of who can be an artist and whether an artist is worthy of exhibiting their works. Each selected artist has cultivated an artistic practice and impressive body of work amidst familial and professional roles and responsibilities. These workshops provided SWF’s inaugural class of Civic Art Fellows the opportunity to interrogate Civic Arts in contrast to more traditional approaches to art and public engagement. Sweet Water Foundation is grateful to each artist for sharing their practice during the Fall Civic Arts Workshops Series.
November 3 | Paper Cutting with Ricardia Davis
On Friday, November 3, artist, Ricardia Davis, shared her practice of paper cutting during the first workshop of the Fall 2023 Civic Arts Workshop. Ricardia has been a part of the SWF Community since 2020, when she became one of the first artists to display works in the Gallery at the [Re]Construction House. The exhibit, Unintentional Intentions (2020), featured Ricardia’s series of intricate coffee filter paper cuttings, reminiscent of lace - fragile yet strong, which spoke to memory and ethnicity. Since the exhibit, Ricardia has not only shared her art, but also her practice of creating healing balms, oils, and ointments from plants at The Commonwealth, such as Calendula Oil.
On November 3, Ricardia discussed her journey as an artist, from her start as an architecture student at Tuskegee University to a career as a Blueprint Quality Technician working in manufacturing, all the while crafting and refining a practice of paper cutting. After the artist talk, she instructed 15 attendees on the basic paper cutting techniques, guiding them to carefully fold and make small cuts along the fold. The workshop demonstrated the possibility of creating art from material found in almost every home.
November 10 | Coffee Painting with Rhonda Long
On Friday, November 10, artist, Rhonda Long, led the second civic arts workshop, sharing one of her many painting techniques - painting with coffee. Rhonda is a local artist who has been engaged with Sweet Water Foundation since her daughter, Candis, brought her to a Farmer’s Market in 2020. Rhonda’s art was featured in Gallery at the [Re]Construction House alongside Ricardia’s art and has been featured in two gallery shows - one in Chicago and one in Florida.
Despite being an extremely talented artist, Rhonda shared that she has been told many times by traditional galleries that they “don’t sell this kind of art and don’t have a clientele for this kind of art here.” SWF’s relationship with Rhonda has been about more than just her “Art” - it has been about recognizing and elevating a holistic artistic practice that moves beyond traditional mediums to include food, memories, relationships, and family. As such, SWF celebrated and featured Rhonda during tours, most recently during a national convening of arts organizations and supporters from the Creative States Coalition held at The Commonwealth.
The November 10 workshop was Rhonda’s first time leading an art workshop at The Commonwealth. The workshop began with a brief [re]membering session about Rhonda’s relationship with SWF, a brief history of watercolor painting, and her artistic journey. Her medium of choice is pencil, but her art also includes painting with coffee, acrylic painting, and sewing. After the [re]membering session, Rhonda led a coffee painting workshop with participants. She taught the group how to use coffee grounds to create watercolor paint and use that paint to create holiday cards. By the end of the workshop, each person had created a unique card using coffee grounds - a resource that many people throw away every day.
November 17 | Collage Making with Dr. Derise “Mama Afua” Tolliver
On Friday, November 17, Dr. Derise “Mama Afua” Tolliver shared one of her favorite art forms - collage making - with the SWF team and community. Mama Afua first connected with SWF in 2020 and has since become a board member and beloved member of the SWF family who shares her wisdom, time, energy, and love with the team and community. Up until this day, however, Mama Afua had not led a workshop at Sweet Water Foundation.
The workshop began with an artist talk with Mama Afua, during which she provided a brief overview of what collage means to her and shared some of her sources of inspiration. She reminded the group of one of the principles of Kwanzaa, Kuumba, which means Creativity. She shared that the Kiswahili translation means “to bring things together to make them more beautiful than they were before in the community.” Mama Afua thinks of college in a similar way, “taking pieces that are often discarded or not honored or revered and bringing them together to make something more beautiful.”
Similar to Ricardia and Rhonda, Mama Afua’s beautiful and intricate collage art has not been celebrated in gallery shows, and she had not thought of her art in ‘that way’ before. Her body of work, however, speaks for itself. SWF is planning an exhibit in 2024 that will feature the works of Mama Afua and her mother, Gwendolyn Tolliver.
Following the artist talk, Mama Afua led an engaging workshop that began with a quick (and fun) collage exercise — participants were invited to grab the newspapers and magazines in front of them and tear it up without thinking about what they were doing. Mama Afua worked the room, energetically instructing participants to “cut and tear” as quickly as they could. The torn-up pieces were then put into a box, mixed up, and redistributed across the room.
Mama Afua then guided the group to “glue and place” – again, encouraging folks to not to think too much about design but to simply create. The result was a room full of quick, beautiful collages. The workshop concluded with a final activity to create a collage inspired by Sweet Water Foundation. Through the experience, participants were introduced to collage as an accessible and easy art form aligned with SWF’s value of transforming ‘wastes’ to resources.
December 1 | Crochet with Darlene Grant
On Friday, December 1, Darlene Grant led a fiber art workshop in Civic Arts Church - an Introduction to Crochet. Darlene first connected with Sweet Water Foundation in 2023 after the passing of her mother left a difficult void in her life after serving as her primary caregiver for an extended period. She felt embraced by the SWF community and felt like she was at home when she was at The Commonwealth. She visited during Friday Farmer’s Markets and, soon after, began participating in weekly Civic Arts Friday activities during the summer.
The team soon learned that Darlene is an extremely talented artist - a jewelry maker and crochet artist among other art forms. During the Fall Civic Arts Workshop, she gave an introduction to crochet. While the workshop was challenging for some participants, Darlene was a patient and supportive teacher, offering individualized support and suggestions for crocheters of all levels. She also stressed the importance of having a space like the Civic Arts Church to give people a chance to learn something new that they could possibly take to another level.
SWF is grateful to each artist for sharing their artistic practice with the team and community. The series is another example of the importance of civic arts to celebrate memories, culture, tradition, history, herstory, and beyond.