Hector Canonge
Neighborhood: Inwood, New York

[Bio]

During his residency Hector transformed his Inwood laundromat into The Inwood Laundromat Language Institute (TILLI) where he taught his Spanish speaking neighbors English. He led a series of language workshops, which took place at Magic Touch laundromat and organized a public event where his students read short compositions that they created during his classes. In addition to teaching basic English classes, Hector created an interactive touchscreen kiosk that documents his students' experiences while enrolled at TILLI. The kiosk is currently installed at Magic Touch.

Image: Students listen while Hector teaches at The Inwood Laundromat Language Institute.

LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs

Neighborhood: Harlem, New York

[Bio]

In her project My Very Own Porch on Ipanema Corner, LaTasha paid homage and gave voice to the neighborhood where she has lived since childhood - Harlem. Bringing her artistic sensibilities as a writer, vocalist, and sound artist to this work, LaTasha explored the social ecosystem of her bustling block corner, which is marked by the Ipanema Laundromat, through printed ephemera and video. Combining video documentary and oral history collection techniques, LaTasha created a platform for her longtime neighbors to share their varying perspectives on the changing face of Harlem. Her residency culminated with the beginnings of a video documentary about her neighborhood and a chapbook of collected prose from her neighbors' musings about their community.

Image: portrait of LaTasha Diggs

Jabari Owens-Bailey
Neighborhood: Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn

[Bio]

In his project Dispersing Planes II, Jabari continued his exploration of the African-American migration experience. Through a series of public interventions that took place at his local laundromat, Jabari collected laundromat patron's emigration stories. Ultimately, Jabari will install a myriad of similar planes in his laundromat and host a public convening for neighbors to share the circumstances or dreams that brought them to Brooklyn.

Image: Jabari transforms African textiles into paper planes in Dispersing Planes I.

Karina Aguilera Skvirsky
Neighborhood: Jersey City, New Jersey

[Bio]

By using the historical legacy of her local laundromat's building as a point of depature, Karina explored the metamorphosis of her Jersey City neighborhood in her project Ask Me: Tell Me.
This project allowed her to archive residents' thoughts about the neighborhood's transformation through drawing, photographic and text-based contributions. From these contributions Karina created a suite of postcards that are now available at her laundromat.

Image: Karina records her neighbor's story at Lucky Laundromat in Jersey City.

Micki Wantanabe Spiller
Neighborhood: Woodside, Queens

[Bio]

In response to public library budget cuts, Micki's project A Woodside Walk: Bubbles and Books Micki engaged her neighbors in a series of literacy-based activities that took place in and around her local laundromat. Micki's activities included creating a hand illustrated local guidebook for parents to use during neighborhood walks with their children, building a book cart for her laundromat and organizing story times for her neighborhood's families.

Image: Micki pulls a new book cart to her local laundromat.