SELECTED PROJECTS
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JUKEBOX, 2019 - present
Old jukeboxes were coin-operated music-players that existed in ordinary spaces such as diners and laundromats. They made music accessible to people from all walks of life, inviting anyone to gather around to listen and enjoy something special together. Jukebox, a public art project created by Elisa H. Hamilton, transforms an original 1960 Seeburg jukebox from a machine that plays music to a machine that plays community stories. The tracks on the jukebox represent a handful of the rich perspectives, backgrounds, and stories of Cambridge community members. Hamilton recorded a number of these stories in partnership with the Cambridge Black History Project. Hamilton was commissioned by the Cambridge Arts Council, City of Cambridge, as part of the Percent-for-Art Ordinance, to create a public art project responsive to the new Foundry. Jukebox joins over 200 other works of public art in the City’s public art collection. In addition, the recorded stories of Jukebox are part of the Archives and Special Collections in the Cambridge Room at the Cambridge Public Library. LISTEN TO THE FIRST 25 STORIES NOW: www.FoundryJukebox.org/stories |
Jukebox is a permanent public art project commissioned by the City of Cambridge under its Percent-for-Art Ordinance. The project is installed in the historic Cambridge Foundry, located between Kendall Square and East Cambridge, that has been transformed into a community center for creativity and collaboration.
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ILLUMINATED OVAL, 2022
Created in celebration of the inauguration of Olin College of Engineering President Gilda A. Barabino, this art installation illuminates the interwoven visual dialogue of Olin College community members. Moving panoramas or “crankies” originated in the 19th century as a form of visual storytelling. These mechanical crank machines were a precursor to moving pictures, and combined handmade stories on scrolls with music and live narration. In this crankie box, we view the illuminated scrolls through an oval that serves as our portal. Scrolls hold deep meaning in many cultures – they can represent the becoming and history of a people, the sharing of knowledge, and the record of a particular moment. The scrolls in this collection are an archive of Olin College and the people who energize this place and belong to this community. As the layered scroll is cranked forward, lines become stories, and we experience a multiplex narrative taking shape. This installation was created by Elisa Hamilton in collaboration with a dedicated Student Community Art Team. |
Community members crank the Illuminated Oval together.
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CREATIVE UNION, 2020 - 2022
Creative Union was a community-centered participatory public art project conceived by Elisa H. Hamilton and organized by the Currier Museum of Art in partnership with the City of Nashua. This project was the inaugural arts event made possible by the Currier Museum Nashua Endowment, which was established to support Currier Museum-organized arts programming for the residents of Nashua. In the summer of 2021, the artist designed and facilitated over a dozen artmaking workshops in which Nashua residents came together with fellow community members to create festive paper sculptures and handmade decorations. The hundreds of art pieces that were created in these workshops then became part of a culminating, joyful community celebration surrounding Nashua City Hall which took place June 10 and 11, 2022. All workshops and programs were free, open to all, fun for all ages, and took place at various locations and with multiple community partners including: Black Lives Matter Nashua, Great American Downtown, Arlington Street Community Center, YMCA of Greater Nashua, Grow Nashua, the PLUS Co., PAL, The Youth Council, Girls Inc., Nashua Community Music School, and the Adult Learning Center. |
Elisa Hamilton makes an art piece with a community member in Nashua, NH. Photo by Kate Preftakes Photography.
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PACK OUR BAGS, 2018-2019
Pack Our Bags is interactive installation in which the public is invited to help The Traveler pack a suitcase filled with the values that will lay the foundations for our next world. In this exploratory installation, the public is encouraged to examine concept sculptures created by the artist and place the objects either in the suitcase for the Traveler to take, or on the floor to leave behind. All are also invited to examine and re-evaluate what others chose to pack, and to re-place objects as they deem necessary. This interactive piece debuted as part of "Interstellar Sanctuary" at the Mills Gallery, Boston in Spring of 2018, and was redeveloped for "Nine Moments for Now" at the Cooper Gallery, Cambridge in Fall of 2018, and was recently installed at the International Center for Photography in New York, NY as part of a special collaboration with For Freedoms. |
"Pack Our Bags" featured in Dig Boston, November 28, 2018
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DRAWN TOGETHER, 2018
Drawn Together was a collaboration with fellow artist Graham Yeager that took place at Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Summer of 2018. The project consisted of an expansive collaborative glass drawing that was created on-site by the artists, as well as a one-day interactive program in which museum visitors were invited to make their own collaborative drawings on glass. In the Drawn Together method, partners stand on separate sides of a glass panel and pull out a random selection from a bucket of written prompts that were developed by the artists. After both partners have seen the prompt, the pair must create a single drawing together with markers tip to tip on separate sides of the glass. While creating the drawing, partners strive to keep their connection to their partner's marker without speaking, and without knowing where the drawing will begin, or how it will end. |
Elisa Hamilton with Artist Collaborator Graham Yeager
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SLIDESHOW, 2017
Commissioned by Now+There, Slideshow took place October 12 - 15, 2017 as part of HUBweek on Boston City Hall Plaza. The project was a series of curated slide talks and an interactive photo series taking place in and around a 20' shipping container. The artist invited ten Boston-area women from varying backgrounds each to photograph a week in her life and then to choose 25 images that she would use to tell her story in an analog slide talk. Slideshow amplified and celebrated the life experiences of ten generous, brave, Boston-area women through photography and storytelling, and invited the public to share in the day-to-day work, family life, and social context of each woman through the women's talks and through physical examination of the images on a communal light table. Learn more about Slideshow here. |
Photo by Sylvia Stagg-Giuliano
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SOUND LAB, 2017
Over the course of one week in March 2017, Elisa Hamilton transformed the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's Calderwood Hall into a hands-on community listening space that featured the sounds of our Boston communities. In this six-month collaboration with four local community organizations, the artist taught workshops focused on listening more closely to the sounds of our ordinary lives, and recorded each community group at work. From this audio, the artist created a collection of 39 custom picture discs that featured the sounds and images of the community groups. The "Sound Lab" featured the custom records along with a selection of vintage records curated to reflect Boston’s rich musical traditions. The artist created a 20' x 20' map of Boston, atop which visitors were invited to touch, hold, and play the records on locally made turntables. During the run of the installation, the artist curated workshops and performances lead by community partner organizations, and hosted an Sound Lab Open Mic each day with a different theme. At the conclusion of the exhibition, the record collections and turntables were gifted to each community partner. Learn more about Sound Lab here. |
"Sound Lab" installation at Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Photo by Leo March
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COMMUNITY LEGACY, 2017
In September 2017, Elisa Hamilton collaborated with the MIT List Center for Visual Art to create a participatory installation in response to the institution's Student Loan Art Program. The Program is an annual tradition since 1969, which allows students to borrow artworks from the List's permanent collection and keep in their homes for the school year. The artist was moved by the generosity of this program, which, instead of hoarding valuable works of art, lends them to students to be enjoyed, creating a positive daily impact in the lives of community members. In the spirit of the generosity of the Student Loan Art Program, the artist asked community members a question about their own giving: "what will you leave behind?" Participants were encouraged to write down their response, tuck it into a box, and place it on a shelving unit that became a growing, physical evidence of community offerings. Participants were encouraged to explore others' responses by peering through the clear acrylic vessels to the writing inside. The 179 results have now been digitally catalogued and are published online as public evidence of the community’s legacy.
Learn more about Community Legacy here.
In September 2017, Elisa Hamilton collaborated with the MIT List Center for Visual Art to create a participatory installation in response to the institution's Student Loan Art Program. The Program is an annual tradition since 1969, which allows students to borrow artworks from the List's permanent collection and keep in their homes for the school year. The artist was moved by the generosity of this program, which, instead of hoarding valuable works of art, lends them to students to be enjoyed, creating a positive daily impact in the lives of community members. In the spirit of the generosity of the Student Loan Art Program, the artist asked community members a question about their own giving: "what will you leave behind?" Participants were encouraged to write down their response, tuck it into a box, and place it on a shelving unit that became a growing, physical evidence of community offerings. Participants were encouraged to explore others' responses by peering through the clear acrylic vessels to the writing inside. The 179 results have now been digitally catalogued and are published online as public evidence of the community’s legacy.
Learn more about Community Legacy here.
DANCE SPOT, 2012 - 2019
Dance Spot is a traveling public art project, in which the artist creates pop-up dance floors in unexpected places and invites the public to dance. Dance Spots are individually created for each location by the artist with different design and choreography for each spot. In Dance Spot’s foundational iteration, the artist transformed the sidewalks of Fort Point into impromptu dance floors. The original project consisted of five dance spots - places to dance - prominently located throughout the Fort Point neighborhood. Each Dance Spot had a colorful dance diagram drawn on the sidewalk, illustrating a specific dance routine that paired with a specific song. Each installation also featured signage that directed the public to the Dance Spot website, where one could stream the songs, watch videos of the dances, and learn to do them on site. Over the years, Dance Spot has engaged with a variety of communities all around Boston, as well as at the DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Lincoln, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, and Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia. In 2020, Dance Spot was included in ICA Boston's Watershed Art Kit program.
Learn more about Dance Spot here.
Dance Spot is a traveling public art project, in which the artist creates pop-up dance floors in unexpected places and invites the public to dance. Dance Spots are individually created for each location by the artist with different design and choreography for each spot. In Dance Spot’s foundational iteration, the artist transformed the sidewalks of Fort Point into impromptu dance floors. The original project consisted of five dance spots - places to dance - prominently located throughout the Fort Point neighborhood. Each Dance Spot had a colorful dance diagram drawn on the sidewalk, illustrating a specific dance routine that paired with a specific song. Each installation also featured signage that directed the public to the Dance Spot website, where one could stream the songs, watch videos of the dances, and learn to do them on site. Over the years, Dance Spot has engaged with a variety of communities all around Boston, as well as at the DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Lincoln, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, and Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia. In 2020, Dance Spot was included in ICA Boston's Watershed Art Kit program.
Learn more about Dance Spot here.
SUPERMARKET, 2016
In this 15-week public art processed-focused residency at Boston Center for the Arts, the artist conceived and created a neighborhood store that sold superpowers. Through community workshops developed and facilitated by the artist, the artist engaged the public with questions and explorations about personal heroism, social responsibility, the superpowers we desire, and the powers inherent to our humanity. In the culmination of the residency, the artist created the Supermarket itself; the artist crafted a line of 15 different superpower products based on public feedback, and “customers” were invited to purchase a superpower from the Supermarket. Visitors made their purchases not with money, but by sharing a superpower which they already possessed with the Supermarket.
Learn more about Supermarket here.
In this 15-week public art processed-focused residency at Boston Center for the Arts, the artist conceived and created a neighborhood store that sold superpowers. Through community workshops developed and facilitated by the artist, the artist engaged the public with questions and explorations about personal heroism, social responsibility, the superpowers we desire, and the powers inherent to our humanity. In the culmination of the residency, the artist created the Supermarket itself; the artist crafted a line of 15 different superpower products based on public feedback, and “customers” were invited to purchase a superpower from the Supermarket. Visitors made their purchases not with money, but by sharing a superpower which they already possessed with the Supermarket.
Learn more about Supermarket here.
LEMONADE STAND, 2016
Lemonade Stand, a Creative City project funded by New England Foundation for the Arts, in collaboration with Silvia Lopez Chavez, used a mobile lemonade cart to bring positive story-sharing public programs to housing developments in Mission Hill, Jamaica Plain, and Dorchester throughout the summer of 2016. Using the concept of "lemons to lemonade," participants were asked to share - in either pictures or words - their personal stories of overcoming challenges in their lives. The project took the form of a traveling artist residency with The Eliot School of Fine and Applied Arts.
Learn more about Lemonade Stand here.
Lemonade Stand, a Creative City project funded by New England Foundation for the Arts, in collaboration with Silvia Lopez Chavez, used a mobile lemonade cart to bring positive story-sharing public programs to housing developments in Mission Hill, Jamaica Plain, and Dorchester throughout the summer of 2016. Using the concept of "lemons to lemonade," participants were asked to share - in either pictures or words - their personal stories of overcoming challenges in their lives. The project took the form of a traveling artist residency with The Eliot School of Fine and Applied Arts.
Learn more about Lemonade Stand here.
STORY LINES, 2013
Story Lines was a public art collaboration with fellow artist Kate Gilbert that took place from October 18 - 20, 2013 along the Fort Point Channel in Boston, MA. The project comprised of an interactive sculpture made of a vertical clothes dryer, and baskets of clothing belonging to people of all ages and genders that told an evolving narrative as participants added and subtracted clothing from it. This work allowed participants to physically and emotionally engage in reshaping narratives together using hanging clothes as a vehicle for expression. Throughout the weekend, the artists took turns "setting the story" with different storylines, and then invited the public to edit and add to the story however they wished. All of the articles of clothing were purchased by the artists from various second-hand stores, and then donated to Goodwill at the conclusion of the project.
Learn more about Story Lines here.
Story Lines was a public art collaboration with fellow artist Kate Gilbert that took place from October 18 - 20, 2013 along the Fort Point Channel in Boston, MA. The project comprised of an interactive sculpture made of a vertical clothes dryer, and baskets of clothing belonging to people of all ages and genders that told an evolving narrative as participants added and subtracted clothing from it. This work allowed participants to physically and emotionally engage in reshaping narratives together using hanging clothes as a vehicle for expression. Throughout the weekend, the artists took turns "setting the story" with different storylines, and then invited the public to edit and add to the story however they wished. All of the articles of clothing were purchased by the artists from various second-hand stores, and then donated to Goodwill at the conclusion of the project.
Learn more about Story Lines here.
