OCTOBER - NOVEMBER - DECEMBER

The artist Legacy Russell is iniviting residents of the EAST VILLAGE and the LOWER EAST SIDE to participate in a "ritual of reclamation".

Inspired by a brazilian tradition, where tied ribbons carry hopes and wishes, community members are invited to ceremonially attach the ribbons to places in the neighborhood that they wish to claim as their own. Local residents, like the artist herself, will symbolically redress the histories of each site, imbued with both tension and anticipation, as spurred forth by the changing landscape.

Rite of Reclamation: MINE (NOT YOURS), asks residents of the East Village and Lower East Side to join the artist in a symbolic reclamation of this geographic site. Over a period of three months the artist will post up signs with this declaration throughout the neighborhood and distribute them to local residents and businesses. Each participant will also be given a ribbon with MINE (NOT YOURS) printed on it. These ribbons can then be fixed to various structures in the area; when the ribbon falls off, it is the hope of the artist that the declaration will be realized. This tradition is based on a similar practice that takes place at the church of Nosso Senhor do Bonfim (Our Lord of the Good End) in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil and has been referenced in a myriad of creative projects, both spiritual and otherwise, throughout contemporary art practice and beyond.

Challenging notions of ownership and provenance, and acknowledging clashes of space and territory as part of the rich history of the area, the Rite of Reclamation is a call to action and an act of solidarity, building on the previous Rite of Remembrance, wherein residents and the artist alike processed the ever-evolving history of two neighborhoods in flux.

Copies of signs reading MINE (NOT YOURS) will be available for download as a PDF. Print these out at your leisure and fix them to a structure in your area.

An online map will be updated with the artist's location in the coming months. Interested participants can follow @OpenCeremony and @TrustArt on Twitter to keep updated on the project’s location.

**GET RIBBONS FROM LEGACY**

FOLLOW @OPENCEREMONY ON TWITTER

-OR-

**DOWNLOAD POSTER**

WATCH THE RITE OF RECLAMATION VIDEO!





MISSED THE FIRST RITE? WATCH THE VIDEO RECAP HERE!

In the debut of Guernica’s new interview series, Madeleine Hunt-Ehrlich visits the studio of Legacy Russell and gets the lowdown on the first "rite" of Russell’s ongoing performance project Open Ceremony.

Having begun in late June, the OPEN CEREMONY project is broken up into four “rites,” each of which will be gradually released into the public realm over 2011 and 2012. Each rite will aim to experiment with a different facet of public worship and remembrance, as inspired by the cultural and social milieu of the East Village and the Lower East Side. The hope for the Open Ceremony project is that it will contribute to an ongoing dialog, building upon the collective consciousness and visual vernacular of two sites undergoing change.

Learn more about the project here: trustart.org/​posts/​42

"LIKE" OPEN CEREMONY ON FACEBOOK:
facebook.com/​OPENCEREMONY