In Performance: iCan Social Project and Exhibition (Brooklyn, NY, USA)

During this experimentally-organized and collectively-curated project, social arts projects and performances become part of a month-long exhibition.

Likewise, the act of collecting cans for the 5c rebate becomes a collaborative social performance and an attempt at survival as 11 artists use the returnable container laws to raise artist fees, gallery space and studio rental, transportation costs, and more. As cans accumulate in the gallery space IV Soldiers, filling up the front window, artists will make performances in and with the cans each Thursday night in September.

Enacted in 1982, the New York State Returnable Container Law hoped to encourage recycling by giving back a rebate of 5c per aluminum beer or soda can. Performance artists have long been adept at recycling trash to make work, relying on the “readymades,” furniture, lumber, clothing, and even food that others discard. Similarly, we keep hearing that art can be relegated as a whole into a “sphere of excess,” lumping art-making in with leisure-time activities such as getting drunk, shopping for pleasure, and going to nightclubs.Can art be a part of daily life? Can it be a profession? Is it worth anything? Are artists useless members of society? The iCan exhibition roots through the garbage for practical responses to these questions.

Anyone can bring 12oz. aluminum cans to IV Soldiers Gallery Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday 7-9pm through August or by appointment ([email protected]). Performances will take place in and using the cans on the Thursday nights in September at IV Soldiers. Cans will also be collected at Panoply Performance Laboratory (104 Meserole St. Brooklyn) and were collected at Grace Exhibition Space in July.

ARTISTS: Chloe Bass, Ivy Castellanos, Quinn Dukes, Miao Jiaxin, Anya Liftig, Geraldo Mercado, Panoply Performance Laboratory (Brian McCorkle and Esther Neff), Itzy Ramirez, Hiroshi Shafer, and Matthew Silver.

Thursday, Aug 30: Opening reception and performances at IV Soldiers – Matthew Silver, Panoply Performance Laboratory (Brian McCorkle and Esther Neff), Geraldo Mercado, and Ivy Castellanos, 8pm

Thursday, Sept 6: Performances at IV Soldiers – Hiroshi Shafer, Itzy Ramirez, and Anya Liftig, 8pm

Thursday, Sept 13: A traveling performance between 3 spaces. The performance will begin at 8pm at IV Soldiers with Brian McCorkle and Esther Neff leading a site-specific traveling performance to Vaudeville Park and the PPL space which will be performance sites for Miao Jiaxin and Matthew Silver.

Thursday, Sept 20:Durational Performances at IV Soldiers – Quinn Dukes, and Chloe Bass, 8pm

Thursday, September 27: Can can at IV Soldiers, can cashing-in party, 8pm

Saturday, September 29: iCan artists will have a booth at BARTERTOWN (Trading Post X: Tomorrow-Morrow Land) as part of the DUMBO Arts Festival