The Growlery is proud to help fund artists during this time of economic uncertainty and through the Covid-19 relief fund was able to help local Oakland artist Bud Snow continue her art practice.

“This grant came at an indispensable time, allowing me to upgrade my broken computer equipment so I can continue working from home during this Pandemic. I make physical art, however a lot of my work is done via a computer - from graphics, to running an online shop with my art products, to applying for public art grants - this gear is essential to my livelihood as an artist.” Bud Snow

The Growlery is honored to collaborate with the Silver Lake History Collective to host the website documentation of a community public art project organized by Eli Caplan and Micah Woods in Los Angeles.

Woven into the fence at the Silver Lake reservoir are the names of 259 unarmed Black people killed by police across the United States. The ages of the victims range from 7 to 72 and their deaths span 71 years.

Woods and Caplan were moved to action by the murder of George Floyd by a Minnesota police officer on May 25, 2020. Via Instagram, they recruited over 150 of their neighbors to participate. In the days following the installation, many contributors added laminated plaques with photographs and biographies of those murdered. The community gathered for a candlelight vigil and march around the reservoir on June 14, 2020, to honor those slain by police.

The Silver Lake History Collective chose to document this important project with several videos and photographs.

Image: from the "Palo Maiden" series, Digital Print, 2020.

We are proud to announce the 2020 Growlery Grant was awarded to Kimberly Acebo Arteche.

Funds from the $15,000 Growlery grant will be used to support sustainability challenges in light of COVID19, studio rent, material research, and interviews with family members in Munting Tubig, Ibaan, Batangas and Pinamalayan, Oriental Mindoro, Philippines. Arteche is developing two new bodies of work with this research.

"Lakas ng Lupa" is a series of environmental portraits narrating diasporic expressions of how our relationships to power shift with our relationships to land.

"Kundiman ng Katawan" is a performative and visual installation using S&M as a metaphor for Filipinx relationships to abusive government and family dynamics. Recontextualized through Philippine materials & history, Kundiman ng Katawan explores S&M as a reclamation of body sovereignty from colonial power dynamics. This project is set to exhibit in late 2021.