Womxn in Windows
Launching on June 15 at 6 pm and running through June 27
Screened 24 hours a day
Seaport District -
Locations at 192 Front Street, 193 Front Street, 10 Fulton Street, 1 Fulton Street
View map +
Presented in partnership with The Howard Hughes Corporation
Womxn in Windows is a multi-part video installation that focuses on the confluence of culture and society in an exploration of female identity. As part of the River to River Festival, Womxn in Windows presents the work of five female-identifying artists; placing videos in the windows and storefronts of Lower Manhattan.
Five American womxn from diverse cultural backgrounds, spanning Guatemala, Haiti, Mexico, Taiwan, South Asia, and the American South, will present video artworks which challenge, both in content and in context, society’s definition of femininity. Videos by Christine Yuan, Jasdeep Kang, Jazmin Garcia, Rikkí Wright, and Stefani Saintonge each explore and share perspectives on their relationships to the identities of womxn, their personal cultures and histories. We see overlaps in ideas around care, ritual, sisterhood and the everyday work of womxn that often gets left unnoticed. Each story is told from a different point of view, yet reveals the same desire for acceptance and respect.
The videos will be on view 24 hours a day from June 15 - 27, 2021, in ten storefront windows in Lower Manhattan’s Seaport District. Guests can watch the films from the street, accessible to all, and tune in to the audio of each film via a QR code on the window. Don’t forget to bring your headphones.
Womxn in Windows is co-curated with Zehra Ahmed.
192 Front Street
A Ritual of Sisterhood, 2018 - Rikkí Wright
Wright's visual poem communicates the complex but powerful relationship within sisterhood.
193 Front Street
Generational Gravity, 2020 - Christine Yuan
Director Christine Yuan explores the ways in which hairstyles are expressions of identity, connections to culture, acts of defiance and extensions - or reimaginations of - lineage.
Fucked Like A Star, 2018 - Stefani Saintonge
Inspired by Morrison’s novel, Tar Baby – and its remarks on how the work of ants, like that of womxn, is often unnoticed, Saintonge's experimental film is “a deeply personal, layered love story.”
10 Fulton Street
Phiran Walli (A Girl Who Walks), 2019 - Jasdeep Kang
Kang's camera spans the body of a female subject navigating through landscapes, creating an emotional map of their family’s history, with migration from Punjab, Pakistan, to the United States.
Flor de Azalea, 2017 - Jazmin Garcia
A montage honoring the larger-than-life stories, histories and realities of immigrant mothers.
1 Fulton Street - All of the above films are repeated at this location
Womxn in Windows is a platform for the perspectives of womxn on culture, identity and society. What started as an annual public exhibition of womxn-made art films in storefront windows is now on a mission to support global cross-cultural dialogue. Centered around the idea that individual differences advance societal strength, the platform believes that learning from one another's cultures and experiences contributes towards a transformative humanity of equality, freedom and respect. By providing a forum for diverse and underrepresented voices and their stories, Womxn in Windows hopes to transform our relationships with each other. Womxn in Windows was founded in 2019 by Zehra Ahmed.
Zehra Ahmed, raised in Karachi, Pakistan, is currently based in Los Angeles. She is the curator and founder of Womxn in Windows with over a decade’s worth of experience in the art and design world.
She moved to the United States in order to study architecture at the Rhode Island School of Design, after which she was hired by Hana Kassem to work at the architecture firm Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF) in New York. Living and working in the city, Zehra observed the diversity of cultures and the richness of the arts, and while at KPF she designed spaces that fostered these qualities. Seeking to build upon that foundation, she later moved to Los Angeles to work with the Haas Brothers, during which time she engaged closely with the art world and the west coast's creative community.
Womxn in Windows was founded in 2019 when Zehra saw a need for more womxn of diverse backgrounds to have opportunities to both show their work in public spaces and engage with one another.
“As an immigrant womxn, I have grown because of the people I have encountered, the values that I have learned along the way and the multiple experiences I have had across cultures, societies and beliefs. These experiences have shown me that we all want the same thing; a just and free life where we can all receive equal rights, love and recognition because of who we are. We are all different and that is our strength.”
Born in Los Angeles, CA, Christine Yuan is an Emmy-award winning Taiwanese-American director. Known for her bold and playful style, and with an instinct for authentic performances that depict organic facets of youth culture and the female experience, she creates worlds that capture the imaginative quality of the human experience.
Yuan worked previously as a creative director for 88rising and has created visuals for Joji, Rich Brian, Summer Walker, GoldLink, to name a few. Her feature documentaries have won Best Culture/History Documentary at the 2018 LA Area Emmy, Best Documentary at the 2018 Golden Mike Awards, and Best Feature Documentary at the 2017 National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Awards. Her commercial work has been shortlisted for D&AD’s Next Director Award, 1.4 Awards Show, Young Guns 15 Awards, and Shoot’s Director’s Showcase. Commercial credits include Prada, Apple, Mercedes-Benz, Reebok, Zara, Tiffany & Co, and more.
Born in Yuba City, CA, Jasdeep Kang is a Punjabi artist investigating harmony, fantasy and care through film, literature, photography and music, currently residing in Brooklyn, NY. As a queer Punjabi first-generation American, Kang’s work celebrates how individual expression leads to collective healing. They are freelancing as a director, videographer and photographer.
Kang has collaborated with the Guerrilla Girls & musician Diaspoura among other artists. Their work has been exhibited at The Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Stanford University and Mills College. They have been published in Nylon Magazine, Surface Mag, KQED and i-D magazine. Kang’s upcoming projects include a multi-media audio visual experience centered on radical self-acceptance and a sci-fi short story series written during quarantine.
Born in Los Angeles, CA, Jazmin Garcia is a first generation Mexican-Guatemalan-American director and cinephile, based in Los Angeles. She has been developing her body of work through music videos and short documentaries.
Her work explores themes of immigration and cultural assimilation, using family histories and her own experiences to weave intimate stories of trauma, magic, amor and the perseverance of hope. Her short films evoke moments of timeless beauty, reveal the sweetness in individual struggle and lend visibility to, and inspire, those whose stories are so often left out of the picture.
Garcia has been published in Dazed and i-D, and has worked with SanCha, AKUA and Phlemuns. Her clients include Baserange, Nike, Netflix, Spotify and many others. Garcia also hosts a monthly NTS show called Como La Flor.
Born in Tuscaloosa, AL, Rikkí Wright is a photographer and filmmaker based in Los Angeles, CA. Her work explores notions of community and sisterhood, especially among womxn of color, and looks at the way a community can mold or expand our ideas of femininity and masculinity, strength and beauty. Wright has sought to question the lines dividing femininity from masculinity, and challenge traditional ideas of what masculine strength should look like.
Her work has been featured in the New York Times, i-D, LALA, Refinery 29 and many other publications. Her film has been shown at Jeffrey Deitch, Los Angeles, Metrograph, New York, and Black Star Fest. Her clients include Girlgaze, Outdoor Voices, Warby Parker and No Sesso.
Born in Long Island, NY, Stefani Saintonge is a Haitian-American filmmaker, educator and editor based in New York. Her work focuses on womxn, youth and immigration.
Saintonge’s work has screened at several festivals and institutions internationally, including Edinburgh International Film Festival, Ann Arbor Film Festival, the Hammer Museum and the Smithsonian African American Museum. Her work as an editor has screened at Sundance Film Festival, Berlin International Film Festival, Tribeca Film Festival, Guggenheim Museum and PBS. As a member of New Negress Film Society, she co-created their annual Black Women’s Film Conference. She has received support from SFFILM, Jerome Foundation and Bronx Arts Council and served as an artist in residence with Haiti Cultural Exchange.