Currency: An Exchange of Artist Solidarity

The first of two events in our 2024 Open Call series, Where should we start? In response to WPA’s question, Gabrielle and Danielle responded: with solidarity with oppressed peoples around the world.

From Puerto Rico to Palestine, artists continuously participate in activism to call for a more just world. For this program, curator Gabrielle Tillenburg and artist Danielle De Jesus joined in conversation about how Puerto Rican artists have long engaged in solidarity with other occupied peoples around the world. They talked about historical and international examples with a specific focus on Danielle’s practice of amending currency with messages that draw attention to international struggles for justice and freedom from oppression. Gabrielle and Danielle invited artists, and others, to join them in considering what values we exchange with each other, each and every day. Following the conversation, Gabrielle and Danielle led an interactive workshop where attendees created their own art by using currency as a canvas, similar to Danielle’s own practice of painting portraits of revolutionaries and everyday people on U.S. currency. Attendees then put this currency back into circulation,* further circulating their own calls for justice. This workshop considered how money is a symbol of federal power, but has the potential to be an exchange of people power.