In 2016, thirteen multi-cultural women in Pittsburgh came together to form a collective with a mission to use multi-disciplinary art to make their stories visible as they relate, connect, and belong to the global majority. They call it the #notwhite collective.
Through similar stories of facing micro-aggressions and trying to fit into the perceived standard, while being the global majority, they sought to heal themselves and the world.
We are bi/multi-racial/cultural, immigrant or descendants of immigrants investigating the many ways we are seen or not seen, how we self-identify and how we seek liberation through sharing space and stories,” share the group on their website.
Some of their recent collaborations and shows include the Cooking Series Stories from our Kitchens and Cultures with TheFrickPittsburgh and the We are the Global Majority window installation at Space Gallery, 812 Liberty Avenue in Pittsburgh in collaboration with the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust. Their forthcoming exhibition, “We are the Global Majority Decolonizing Space,” celebrating 30 women of the global majority, opens June 4 at SPACE gallery, Pittsburgh Downtown #pittsburghculturaltrust.
Join them for dinner on May 21st. They will be live-streaming a dinner party with members of the #notwhite Collective and with it, a window into how 13 women artists dream forward an inclusive, healing humanity, where one can be fully who we are. In the face of the nuanced oppression today, we make our stories visible as we relate, connect, and belong to the global majority, living on and finding joy, peace, and love.
The women who form the collective include –
- Zena Ruiz – a mother, a lover, and optimist from Houston, TX
- Fran Flaherty – Deaf artist and educator, first-generation immigrant from the Philippines
- Carolina Loyola-Garcia – multidisciplinary artist, filmmaker, and educator
- Liana Maneese – award-winning activist, visionary entrepreneur, doula, liberation psychotherapist, and catalyst for creative engagement
- Alison Zapata – Pittsburgh-born, second-generation Mexican-American visual artist and art educator
- Sarika Goulatia – feminist.activist.artist.thinker.writer.creator.mother.immigrant.social justice warrior.
- Geña – an interdisciplinary international recording artist
- Sara Tang – a multidisciplinary artist, illustrator, and creative facilitator
- Dr. Amber Epps – multidisciplinary artist, lyricist, professor, witch, curator, advocate, mom
- Maggie Negrete – multidisciplinary artist and designer
- Maritza Mosquera – Artist, Human Liberation Educator, Lover, Mother, Friend
- Veronica Corpuz – first-generation Filipina American poet and multimedia artist
- Christiane Dolores – first-generation Afro-Deutsch: artist, storyteller, objectmaker, soundscaper, cultural provocateur
“The #notwhite collective expresses the multifaceted aspects of self-defined liberation. They accept cultural fluidity as a means of seeing and being seen, each member declaring their existence, individually and collectively, through their voices, bodies, and art.”
Their work is an exploration of how the women self-identify and how they seek liberation through sharing space and stories, research and art-making, discussing the history of imperialism and its effect on the whole, non-white world.
Learn more about the #notwhite collective and follow their work at https://www.notwhitecollective.com/.
