Friday 19th December 2014WoCA moves from Race Street; Takes Artspace Hiatus, will continue through satellite exhibitions and community arts programs.
PRESS RELEASE Lauren Cross (817)901-7135 www.wocaprojects.com December 18, 2014 WoCA MOVES FROM RACE STREET; WILL CONTINUE THROUGH SATELLITE EXHIBITIONS AND COMMUNITY ARTS PROGRAMS Dear WoCA Supporters, Family, and Friends, Some of you have inquired with great concern about the recent events on Race Street that hit the Riverside community surrounding the gallery, and after talking to many of our advisors and supporters we have made the decision to move from our current location on Race Street. This move is a very difficult decision as we have enjoyed being a part of the synergy of the Riverside Arts District community, which has thrived and will continue to thrive as an important arts community in Fort Worth. We are thankful to the Artist Studios on Race Street, Debbie Stein (RAD Organizer/Leader), Flora Brewer, and many more for there continued support of WoCA and our many initiatives in the nearly 2 years that we have been on Race Street. We’ve informed a select few in the arts community about our move, and have already received many kind words of support as we look for our new location. We are comforted that others agree with our desire to ensure the safety of our constituents and supporters. With that being said, WoCA will be taking a brief “artspace hiatus” until we finalize our future space. In the meantime, we WILL continue our work in the community. Thanks to the success of our recent crowd-funding campaign, our amazing supporters and sponsors, and new partnerships with local arts and community organizations we will launch our new community arts programs in Fort Worth in 2015! If anything, during this brief “hiatus” we hope that WoCA will have a stronger “local” presence within neighborhoods in Fort Worth, through “satellite” exhibitions, events, and community art programs! We will be moving from Race Street in January 2015, so be sure to email us at info@wocaprojects.com to catch our current exhibition the 2nd Annual Juried Artists’ Books Exhibition. Continue to follow our Facebook page, website, and mailing list as we plan to bring you more innovative exhibitions, events, and programs in 2015. We hope to provide you updates in the near future regarding our new location! Yours truly, Lauren Cross Founder WoCA Projects
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Tuesday 02nd December 2014WoCA releases Indiegogo campaign for community arts programs on #GivingTuesday, December 2, 2014
Contact:
Lauren Cross
2902 Race Street, Suite 100
Fort Worth, Texas 76111
www.wocaprojects.com
info@wocaprojects.com
(817) 901-7135
WoCA releases Indiegogo campaign for community arts programs on #GivingTuesday, December 2, 2014
December 2,2014—Fort Worth, Texas—#GivingTuesday is a global day of giving back online, and a response to the consumer culture activities involved with Black Friday and CyberMonday. #GivingTuesday, with its social media tag, was meant to encourage a global culture of not simply consuming but “giving” to important causes both locally and globally. So in partnership with crowd-funding platform, Indiegogo, Fort Worth-based art non-profit, WoCA Projects, has launched a campaign to encourage the local community to be not only givers but active participants in some new community arts programs.
So far WoCA’s initial campaign goal of $2500 was raised within a week before #GivingTuesday even started and now WoCA Founder, Lauren Cross, is ready to push the campaign to the next level. “I feel that it is a very important time in history and in our community to be a part of transformative change. We need change desperately, and creative action has always been one of the most affective catalysts for change.” WoCA’s campaign lists an ambitious list of new programs that will be piloted in 2015, including ongoing art-making activities for local children in need of creative development and exposure; a young curators program that mentors, trains, and develops young women ages 13-17 for careers in the arts, particularly curating; an artist grant for artists of color in the local community, and a creative entrepreneurship initiative that aims to train women experiencing great economic hardship with creative tools towards financial empowerment. The campaign even plans to hire local artists and creative entrepreneurs to teach select programs.
WoCA’s initial goal was raised through a soft launch one week prior to #GivingTuesday through personal emails and Facebook. “I am really blown away by the overwhelming support that we received within the first week. It was amazing to see so many people who believed in the potential of this project to make a difference. And now that we’ve met that goal we are just charged to do more.” WoCA has already made all of the necessary partnerships with local community organizations to bring art and creative entrepreneurship programs to the individuals the organization hopes to serve. “I completely believe in the idea of not re-inventing the wheel, and what we’ve found is that there are many organizations already serving the people that we want to reach who are just as excited about reaching the women and children they serve through art and creative practice just as much as we do. So I am just excited that we will be able to move forward. By doubling our goal it simply allows us to reach more people and support them with more resources.”
Though WoCA hopes to raise all desired funds on #GivingTuesday their Indiegogo campaign ends on December 22nd. “We are hopeful that we will not only reach our goal but surpass it. It will take a ‘village’ to do that” says Cross. For more information about WoCA’s Indiegogo campaign visit: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/art-in-community-programs-at-woca-projects/x/2813367#home
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Tuesday 18th June 2013NEW EXHIBITIONS OPEN AT WOCA PROJECTS ON JUNE 21ST
PRESS RELEASE CONTACT Lauren Cross Director/Curator (817) 901-7135 The Exchange: A Portfolio By Bump It Mafia & Epitome and the UnConcept: Sculptures by Hiroko Kubo Fort Worth, Texas—June 1, 2013— NEW EXHIBITIONS OPEN AT WOCA PROJECTS ON JUNE 21ST WoCA Projects will open two solo exhibitions on Friday, June 21st: The Exchange: A Portfolio By Bump It Mafia, which features the group portfolio of Bump It Mafia! a collective of modern women celebrating womanhood through printmaking and highlighting the importance of camaraderie and community not just amongst women, but amongst all artists of all backgrounds. Bump It Mafia’s portfolio has toured both nationally and internationally, and while not a stranger to the DFW area ( featuring shows in both Denton and Dallas), the upcoming show marks the group’s first portoflio viewing in the city of Fort Worth. Participating artists include: Emily Arthur, Heather Bryant, Nicola Buffa, Lisette Chavez, Ana Hurtado-Gonzales, Carrie Lingscheit, Emmy Lingscheit, Rachael Madeline, Kristine Joy Mallari, Saegan Moran, Meghan O’Connor, Kathryn Polk, Coco Rico, Jessica Robles, Andrea Rogers, Linda Santana, Jenny Schmid, Katy Seals, and Cat Snapp. Epitome and the UnConcept: Sculptures by Hiroko Kubo is a solo exhibition featuring sculptures by Japanese artist Hiroko Kubo. Kubo’s work translates the spheres of unconceptualized personal experiences into sculptural forms that recount emotions, memories, and perceptions. Kubo describes her sculptures as “’frames’ of the elusive subject, that aim to extract the essence of my experiences” while “leav[ing] space for the thoughts, images, and sensations of the viewers.” Born in Hiroshima, Japan, Hiroko Kubo graduated from Hiroshima City University with a BFA in sculpture (2009), and received her MFA from Texas Christian University in 2013. Kubo is a recipient of the Hiroshima International Cultural Foundation, and her work has been exhibited in solo and group shows both in Japan and in the United States. Kubo was recently selected as an exhibiting artist for the 2013 Texas Biennale from September 5-November 9th at the Blue Star Contemporary Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas. Both exhibitions will open on Friday, June 21st from 6-8 p.m. and will run through July 20th, 2013 Come out and enjoy the opening reception, which will feature light refreshments and drinks. WoCA Projects is free and open to the public. ABOUT WOCA PROJECTS WoCA Projects is a non-profit artspace featuring contemporary art by emerging, mid-career, and established women artists of color, and diversifying the contemporary art landscape through exhibitions and community arts programming. WoCA Projects is a sponsored project of Fractured Atlas, a non-profit arts service organization. Contributions for the purposes of WoCA Projects must be made payable to Fractured Atlas and are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. The space is located in the budding Riverside Arts District on Race Street, in the Riverside community in Fort Worth. During exhibition runs the gallery is open by appointment. Contact Lauren Cross by calling (817) 901-7135 or emailing info@wocaprojects.com. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ WoCA Projects 2902 Race Street, Suite 100 Fort Worth, Texas 76111 (817) 901-7135
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Saturday 20th April 2013
PRESS RELEASE CONTACT Lauren Cross Director/Curator (817) 901-7135 Eco-impressionism: The Visual Journal of Coco Rico & From Black to Daylight: Caricatures, Obscurities, and Cultural Illuminations by Joy Ude Fort Worth, Texas—March 19, 2013— NEW EXHIBITIONS OPEN AT WOCA PROJECTS ON MAY 11TH ; WOCA PROJECTS DIRECTOR, LAUREN CROSS RECIPIENT OF ONE OF THE FORT WORTH WEEKLY”s THIRD ANNUAL VISIONARY AWARDS WoCA Projects will open two solo exhibitions, featuring artists Coco Rico and Joy Ude on Saturday, May 11th. Eco-Impressionism features nature-inspired drawings by Coco Rico, which documents her memories of vegetation, her parents’ work in agricultural and farming industries, and her efforts to capture the impressionistic memories from her cultural environment. Rico calls her work a “visual journal,” in which each work bears symbolic gestures, stories from her personal narrative, and allegorical meanings represented through leaves, branches, birds and small, almost legible, writing. Rico’s work reflects her Mexican cultural background and her influences from other artists, such as Richard Peterson, Matthew Hopson-Walker, David Morrison, and Laura Melancon. Rico is currently a MFA student in Printmaking at the University of Dallas in Irving, Texas, and grew up among a proud Mexican community in Los Angeles California. She uses her arts education as a tool to reconstruct her ‘role” within traditional Mexican culture. From Black to Daylight features a series of provocative installations by artist Joy Ude that helps to illuminate the ramifications of caricature images upon contemporary Black American culture. Ude’s work employs numerous techniques to construct her sculptural forms including hand-drawn sketches, CAD design, and both fiber-specific and metal-specific techniques. Ude’s multi-scaled constructions address important moments in cultural history, such as the Clark Doll experiments, and both historic and contemporary caricature imagery as a root to long lasting issues with self-concept and self-esteem affecting Black Americans as youth and developing into adult life. Ude is a nationally exhibited, Texas-based fiber artist with prior origins in the fashion industry. She is currently a MFA Fibers candidate at the University of North Teas, and lives and works in Denton, Texas. All exhibitions will open on Saturday, May 11th from 6-8 p.m. and will run through June 7th, 2013 Come out and enjoy the opening reception, which will feature light refreshments and drinks. WoCA Projects is free and open to the public. In March 2013, WoCA Projects director, Lauren Cross, who is a local Fort Worth artist, was a recipient of The Fort Worth Weekly’s Third Annual Visionary Awards. See the Fort Worth Weekly’s profile for more details. ABOUT WOCA PROJECTS WoCA Projects is a non-profit artspace featuring contemporary art by emerging, mid-career, and established women artists of color, and diversifying the contemporary art landscape through exhibitions and community arts programming. WoCA Projects is a sponsored project of Fractured Atlas, a non-profit arts service organization. Contributions for the purposes of WoCA Projects must be made payable to Fractured Atlas and are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. The space is located in the budding Riverside Arts District on Race Street, in the Riverside community in Fort Worth. During exhibition runs the gallery is open from Thursday to Saturday from 10-3 p.m. and by appointment. Contact Lauren Cross by calling (817) 901-7135 or emailing info@wocaprojects.com. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ WoCA Projects 2902 Race Street, Suite 100 Fort Worth, Texas 76111 (817) 901-7135
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Friday 11th January 2013
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