Call and Response 2025
According to artist Daniel Minter, “by sharing space, you make it larger.” At Lynden, we share space—and make it larger–by creating the conditions for thoughtful production, fruitful collaboration, and innovative presentation for artists of color. Since 2015, Call & Response–a cumulative, cross-disciplinary, community-focused, artist-driven initiative–has brought together artists, scholars, educators, and community members to construct a space for artists of color to celebrate the radical Black imagination as a means to re-examine the past and imagine a better future. We build the Call & Response community through residencies, exhibitions, performances, educational and public programs, and collaborations and site visits with new artists. This summer Arielle Julia Brown, Folayemi Wilson, Reggie Wilson, and Arianne King Comer will be in residence.
As we approach the tenth anniversary of Folayemi Wilson’s ELIZA’S PECULIAR CABINET OF CURIOSITIES, Folayemi Wilson’s installation on the grounds of the Lynden Sculpture Garden, we are working with Arielle Julia Brown on Sounding Eliza, a sonic exploration that will journey with visitors across Lynden’s grounds to the Cabinet.
During her June residency, Arielle is inviting community members to offer their voices to the transcendent and collective sound of Eliza. She will be conducting workshops where we will engage storytelling, song, sound-making and gentle (accessible) movement drawing inspiration from the Cabinet. The workshops will generate sound for the Sounding Eliza project. She will be joined by Folayemi Wilson for several of these workshops.
Help Us Find Eliza: To round out Sounding Eliza, we are looking for women and girls named Eliza (ages 3 - 100+) across the Milwaukee region to be in conversation with this project. Do you know an Eliza/Elizabeth/Liz/Eli who might have impactful stories to contribute? If so, please send them to Polly Morris at pmorris@lyndensculpturegarden.org.
Arianne King Comer will be at Lynden for several weeks beginning in mid-July, resuming her open-air batik studio and participating in our HOME Family Workshop Day and Bombazo on July 19.
Choreographer Reggie Wilson returns in August for his annual research residency, during which he hosts artists and scholars engaged with his practice.
Call & Response leaves many traces on the grounds here at Lynden. Be sure to visit Folayemi Wilson’s ELIZA’S PECULIAR CABINET OF CURIOSITIES; the nearby LIZZIE’S GARDEN, part of Portia Cobb’s project here; and Daniel Minter’s MUTI, installed at the end of his two-year-long project, In the Healing Language of Trees. There’s also his beautiful birdhouse, a gift to the imaginary Eliza, a few paces from the Cabinet.
For information on past Call & Response programming: 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024
Additional Call & Response programming will be announced as it is scheduled.
Lynden’s Call & Response programming is supported by the Brico Fund, the Chipstone Foundation, the Greater Milwaukee Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Wisconsin Arts Board with funds from the State of Wisconsin and the National Endowment for the Arts, and several individual donors.
