Space Brainz–Yerba Buena 3000: Damon Rich & Jae Shin

Exhibitions

Space Brainz–Yerba Buena 3000: Damon Rich & Jae Shin

June 30, 2017–January 28, 2018

In the second installment of THE CITY INITIATIVE, which highlights architects, designers, planners, and artists creating provocative work in urban environments, YBCA features a project with 2017 MacArthur Fellow Damon Rich and Jae Shin, partners in the design studio Hector, where the art center becomes a laboratory for dissecting how power works through built space.

Space Brainz–Yerba Buena 3000 is an exhibition that presents Hector’s recent experiences from contested architecture and planning projects in North American cities. These stories, involving spiked fences, faulty sidewalks, grassroots riverfront development, and other architectural hijinks, are illustrated through Hector’s models, drawings, photographs, and mock-ups. Contained in a unified structure filling the gallery, the exhibition resembles a futuristic city where clashing interests maneuver to shape the world.

Installation view, Damon Rich and Jae Shin: Space Brainz—Yerba Buena 3000, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, 2017. Courtesy Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Photographs by Charlie Villyard.

About Hector

Hector is an urban design, planning and civic arts studio whose recent projects include a memorial for an eco-feminist nun, a riverfront park, a fourteen-foot city model celebrating the 350th anniversary of the founding of Newark, New Jersey, and an experimental exhibition on mortgage finance.

Brochure for Space Brainz–Yerba Buena 3000

Damon Rich and Jae Shin of Hector in conversation with Lucía Sanramón.

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Damon Rich & Jae Shin Hector: Space Brainz—Yerba Buena 3000 is part of The City Initiative, a series of case studies by architects, designers, planners, and artists creating provocative work in the urban environment. It is curated by Lucía Sanromán, director of visual arts, and organized by Martin Strickland, exhibitions associate. Damon Rich is the first City Initiative Fellow at YBCA.

Hector thanks/credits:
Space Brainz—Yerba Buena 3000 features collaborations with organizations including the Center for Urban Pedagogy (CUP), Ironbound Community Corporation, MIT Center for Advanced Visual Studies, Lower East Side Ecology Center, Modsaica, MTWTF, Newark/Essex Foreclosure Taskforce, New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark Municipal Green Team, Newark Office of the Urban Enterprise, Newark Planning Office, Newark Riverfront Revival, Mural Arts Philadelphia, SEAMAAC, SPARK, Friends of Riverfront Park, The Trust for Public Land, Unified Vailsburg Services Organization, Weintraub Diaz Landscape Architecture, Yendor Productions & students from City As School High School, Greater Newark Conservancy Junior Rangers, Philadelphia Youth Network, Saint Vincent Academy, Sussex Avenue School & UVSO summer camp.

Special appearances by Newark-based artists Manuel Acevedo, DJ Lilman, DJ Omar Abdallah, Kevin Darmanie, Jerry Gant, Gladys Barker Grauer, Kevin Sampson, Armisey Smith, Bisa Washington, Malik Whitaker & Jay Wilson.

Hector would like to thank the Graham Foundation for their support of the research for Space Brainz—Yerba Buena 3000 and the National Endowment for the Arts for their support of Newark Riverfront Revival and People Power Planning Newark.

Promotional support provided by AIASF.

Yerba Buena Center for the Arts is grateful to the City of San Francisco for its ongoing support.

YBCA Programs in 17–18 are made possible in part by: The James Irvine Foundation.

Additional Funding for YBCA Programs 17–18: National Endowment for the Arts, Abundance Foundation, Grosvenor, and Members of Yerba Buena Center for the Arts.

YBCA Exhibitions 17–18 are made possible in part by: The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Panta Rhea Foundation, and Meridee Moore and Kevin King.

Lead image: Installation view, Damon Rich and Jae Shin: Space Brainz—Yerba Buena 3000, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, 2017. Courtesy Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Photographs by Charlie Villyard.