October 1, 2025 Summer 2025
all viewfinders are intimate invitations to look close and slow down an invitation to move at the pace of slow a click of a photo with a touch so light a record of a walk, kept in our palm, in our pocket a trace of our eyes, of this path, of today a print, a multitude, a broadcast
– Excerpt from ‘Viewfinder Manifesto’
A viewfinder cut-out, shaped almost like a set of sharp teeth, or an amorphous blob, frames the view of a bridge on the highwayWe created a shared language based on street practices that liberated our blocks, neighborhoods, cities, practices, and minds. With a viewfinder in hand, we moved at the pace of deep listening and an urgency of freeing them all. We gathered on the sidewalk (the name of our encrypted shared notes document tool), in zines, in the in-between buildings, and we crafted collective language to try and make sense of moving through public spaces. The Viewfinder Manifesto, written by Lukaza, was one of the key gestures grounding our street practice during the five weeks we spent together. Early in the class, we agreed: Everything is a viewfinder! We are all practitioners of the viewfinder!
A cloud-shaped viewfinder frames a shot from the street, where we see mapping signage and construction machineryThe hole in a peach ring, scissor handles, a CD. And on viewfinder walks and meanders we went. We journeyed through space, looking through viewfinders we made together. We declared ourselves present, focused, and ready to look at our surroundings with fresh eyes. In doing so, we questioned our place within our respective communities and began to craft meaningful interventions.
A bio-degradable four-panel viewfinder cut into a leaf lying on concrete
A double viewfinder cut into the shape of spikey stars. The co-learner situates what appears to be a police powerbox in the top part of their viewfinder and passers-by approaching a crossroads on the other. The word “whisper” is scattered multiple times, surrounding both ends of the viewfinder.In the spirit of our class, let’s take a viewfinder walk, stopping once for each week we spent together, and peeking at some of the passing thoughts and outputs that we arrived at. You might make a paper viewfinder- cut or tear a window in a piece of paper, hold up a CD to the sky, let your mind become the finder…. let’s move slow.
A bright yellow, duck-shaped viewfinder frames shadows on a park walkway.View 1: Maintenance
We hold memory together
We cultivate a shared study
We construct critically and with care
When harm is done by us or others, we prioritize a non carceral response where needed
We lean into being disruptive (affirmative)
We will be open to learning and imperfections
We acknowledge public space is beyond just the street ( libraries, parks, public access to water bodies, public transportation, community gardens, restrooms & drinking water)
We acknowledge public space includes more-than-human agencies and obligations to them
We should not have to displace people to have public space (they are not mutually exclusive) ; we need practices for being a good guest/visitor
We ask what the rules are of sharing public space, should there be? How are these rules decided? How do we find balance between free use and consent?
We is actionable<3
—Excerpts from the TO THE STREETS Manifesto for the collective class space, practicing in the streets, maintenance of the publics, written by the class
View 2: Movement
Notes from our sidewalk:
How do artists tell the stories no others can? What is our role…roles within the streets? (making worlds in the streets, portals, collective imagining, visual assembly)
“In the process of winning small victories, the idea of taking on larger structures becomes a real prospect.”<3
melting into the community
Still from Pope L. speaking about his work, The Crawl. In this shot, we see him as a silhouette in the bright sun, walking by a fence in Tompkins Square Park
Still from Pope L. speaking about his work, The Crawl. In this shot, we see a photo of Pope L. performing the work. He is in a suit, crawling on the pavement, with a small yellow potted plant in hand. The photo is annotated “Tompkins Square Park Crawl, 1991”We watched Pope. L talk about The Crawl, 1991 at Tompkins Square Park
View 3: Intervention
Snapshots from our mapping workshop with Misha Alia Awad, who’s sharing her screen on a QGIS window. On QGIS, she has a hand-drawn map overlaying a satellite base map.
Misha demonstrates how to digitize our mapped route using QGIS. We see a blue dotted line outlining the sketched route, and red pin points.Notes from our class with guest artist and map maker, Misha Alia Awad:
- mapping language as disruptive tool
- 10 paces -> 10 mm making every dash 10 paces
- I love pace as a unit of measurement
- I love the idea of playing with labeling.
- You COULD label landmarks literally, or use questions as labels or something fun
- Drawing a map/learning directions old school makes you self reliant for cases of “emergency”
- as someone who has been trying to get more into mapmaking for a while this has been SO helpful thank you!! ARGs/geocaching were my intro to mapmaking, but i also found myself mapmaking while tenuously housed to map resources/bathrooms/safe places to rest without having reliable access to a phone/the internet
- Counter-mapping!
- this really rings true in many places in Palestine, such as Jenin Camp, where the IOF continues to attack and intrude, but continuously prove they do not understand how refugees have built the camp and live in it and navigate it, making it so hard to "conquer”
- Interrupting history
- made by & for a very specific location
- creating data from anything
- maps to be used as emergency tools
- compass at hips….parallel to the ground
- mapping as a dance
- Pace: to a beat: heel to toe
- a map that runs off the paper
- should you know where you are?
- map as archive
- how to disappear
View 4: Publishing
Publishing our first stencils
Publishing biodegradable graffiti/signage/viewfinders
Publishing baby zines!
Publishing community zine libraries and bulletin boards
Publishing art builds and direct action
Publishing community built altars with weatherproof materials
Publishing a secret code language
A gif maneuvering around a collaborative board which includes some of the interventions that people worked on throughout class. From baby zines to biodegradable viewfinders and signage to weather-proof altars.View 5: Collective
A moment in class, reciting an excerpt from Toolkit from Cooperative, Collective, & Collaborative Cultural Work, audio clip and transcript belowClip transcript:
L: “Maybe we should all read it aloud! Unmute, everyone unmute.”
S: “Let’s do it!”
L: “Okay… we wanna make something larger than ourselves. Sometimes you need people to.”
rest of the group joins, sound delay, beautiful chaos ensues
Everyone:
“-hold you. Survival. We feel connected to a shared struggle. We challenge ourselves and others to learn and grow. There is power in solidarity. Collective work means shared resources and skills. We are working to create utopian experiential educational structures. It’s nourishing to work with others. Knowing how to work cooperatively is a basic building block for resisting the state. Non-transactional love, emotional work, anti-capitalism. Personal growth. Support and safety. Multiple perspectives enable more nuanced work. We need to address urgent problems together. In order to reflect on yourself, you need to know yourself in the context of others. Letting go of our egos. It’s fun to socialize with a purpose. Shared voice. Sharing privilege and sharing power.”
giggles
Thank you for going on this walk with us. For your slowness and trust. For your shared eyes and your unique visionary ways.
Much love from your fellow street practitioners,
Take it to the street and fuck the police,
Lukaza and Sarah
P.S… Street resources, some from our syllabus, some shared by co-learners: To The Streets! Resources.