Open Studios

Meet KODA’s Land + Envi­ron­ment sea­son artists-in-res­i­dence Bet­ty Yu and Sari Carel at Swale House.⁠

In the course of her res­i­den­cy with KODA, Bet­ty Yu is explor­ing new forms of sto­ry­telling, mixed media col­lage, exper­i­men­tal video, new media and counter car­tog­ra­phy prac­tices. She is work­ing on a re-envi­sioned people’s map through a decol­o­nized, de-gen­tri­fied, racial jus­tice frame­work that high­lights people’s hopes for the com­mu­ni­ty, untold his­to­ries and brings to focus the places erased by dom­i­nant narratives. ⁠⁠

Sari Carel is devel­op­ing City of Trees, a social­ly engaged sound and sun-print project that engages with local com­mu­ni­ties and his­to­ries, and explores the often over­looked rec­i­p­ro­cal rela­tion­ship between New York­ers and urban trees. It is guid­ed by con­tact print­ing and sound ele­ments based on the city’s urban for­est. As part of a pub­lic engage­ment pro­gram dur­ing the res­i­den­cy Sari is focus­ing on tree stew­ard­ship, activism as self care, and cen­ter­ing of the role of African-Amer­i­can activists in renew­ing Brooklyn’s urban forest. ⁠