Join us to see the SUSTAIN installation and soundwalk and an outdoor screening of short films by Storytelling with Saris about sustainable practices and the impacts of climate on agriculture and food security. We will have a Q & A with filmmakers after the screening. Films start at sundown.

Please bring a smartphone and earphones to experience the soundwalk, which will be accessed with QR codes.

Film/livestream for Sustain: Paris Preston Music & Sound Design for Sustain: Sonia Herrero
Filmmakers: Monica Jahan Bose, Leena Jayaswal, and Paris Preston

With poetry, songs, and sari art co-created with women farmers of Katakhali Village, Bangladesh and the people of Washington DC. SUSTAIN is a collective response to sustainability and the climate crisis featuring community-sourced poetry and art on saris. Co-created with women farmers from Bose’s ancestral island village in Bangladesh and DC participants of public sari and urban gardening workshops, the saris wrap around the six grand columns of LINE DC’s façade, and create a welcoming passageway at Unity Park. SUSTAIN marks ten years of the collaborative climate justice project Storytelling with Saris.

This project is funded by the DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities, Public Art Building Communities Grant Program and supported by community and media partners Boathouse Group, The LINE DC, Licking Creek Bend Farm, Adams Morgan BID, We Act Radio, WPFW 89.3, and Moms Clean Air Force.

Sustain DC team members include: Maps Glover and Kia Green (project support), Timoteo Murphy (installation support) and sari artists/poets Sonja Berry, Sherri Gales, Dominic Green, Mya Green, Lala Forbes, Rashika Johnson, Philip Mecham, Lia Totty, Demetria Willis, Yaunesha Moore, Kat Wicham, Deangelo Barnes, Jumoke Opeyemi, and many more.April 22, 2021 11 am – 1 pm Live from Washington DC, Storytelling with Saris celebrates Earth Day 52 through a hybrid event featuring artist Monica Jahan Bose, curator Sarah Tanguy, and climate leader Elizabeth Brandt of Mom’s Clean Air Force. We will discuss the impact of the ten year long Storytelling with Saris project and the upcoming June 2022 SUSTAIN public art installation and work on sari art and concrete actions to address urgent climate and environmental issues. The studio audience will be working on sari art for the SUSTAIN installation, and the online audience will also be able to participate in the discussion and add their voices to the sari.

Storytelling with Saris was launched by Bose ten years ago and continues to highlight stories of climate injustice and resilience from Katakhali Village, Bangladesh to Washington DC, engaging thousands of people around the world through co-creation labs, performances, films, and public art installations.

No food or drink will be provided. Please support local businesses and purchase drinks and food from The LINE DC’s No Goodbyes and all the many wonderful eateries in Adams Morgan. Tables on terrace and first come first serve. Free event with seating on The LINE DC steps.

All event Links: http://storytellingwithsaris.com/events/

About the filmmakers:

Monica Jahan Bose: Monica Jahan Bose is a Bangladeshi-American artist and climate activist whose work spans painting, printmaking, performance, film, and interdisciplinary projects. Her socially engaged work highlights the intersection of climate, racial, gender, and economic injustice through co-created workshops and temporary public art installations and performances. Her solo projects and performance/installations have been presented at such venues as the MACRO Contemporary Art Museum (Rome), the Bangladesh National Museum, Art Asia Miami, Twelve Gates Gallery, the Brooklyn Museum, the DUMBO Arts Festival, (e)merge art fair, SELECT Art Fair Miami Beach, UNESCO (Paris), and the Smithsonian APA Center (Honolulu). She has received numerous grants, awards, and public art commissions. She is the creator of STORYTELLING WITH SARIS, a longterm art and advocacy project with her ancestral village of Katakhali, Bangladesh. Her work has appeared in the Miami Herald, the Washington Post, Art Asia Pacific, the Milwaukee Sentinel, the Honolulu Star Advertiser, the Japan Times, and all major newspapers in Bangladesh. She has a BA in the Practice of Art (Painting) from Wesleyan University, a post-graduate Diploma in Art from Santiniketan, India, and a JD from Columbia Law School.

Leena Jayaswal is a documentary filmmaker, award-winning photographer with deep expertise and interest in issues that intersect race, representation and identity. Her photography has been nationally recognized in galleries around the country, including solo shows at the Gandhi Memorial Center, and International Visions Gallery. Group shows include Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, The Washington Project for the Arts/ Corcoran Gallery of Art, Arlington Arts Center, Photoworks, Hilyer Art Space, Kathleen Ewing Gallery, Lexington Art League and the Studio Gallery. Jayaswal’s images are in collections at Center for Photography, En Foco, Light Work, Photo Center Northwest through Society for Photographic Education and the Asian American Arts Centre. Her award winning films have been screened in various film festivals around the country. “Crossing Lines” was picked up for national distribution by NETA and has been broadcast on over 100 PBS affiliates across the country. The film has won numerous international and national awards and is currently being distributed by New Day Films. Previously she has worked for famed photographer, Mary Ellen Mark, and with the Sandra Berler Gallery. Currently she is an Associate Professor in the School of Communication at American University. She received her MFA in Photography (summa cum laude) from the Maryland Institute College of Art and two BA’s in Visual Media and Anthropology from American University. She has been working with Bose on the Storytelling with Saris films since 2015.

Paris Preston is a Producer, Director and Artist, who has created commercials, photographs and various media for companies, brands, non-profits, news organizations and creatives including Acura, SMS Audio, The American Advertising Federation, Greenpeace, Discovery, The Washington Post and Capital Hill Area Workshop. He also creates music videos, films, livestream events, and projections. Since 2019, he has been photographing the DC workshops and events of Storytelling with Saris and working on the films.