Art in odd Places Festival 2011, New York //

The project is an extrapolation from of the sacred Jewish rite of folding and wedging bits of paper into the cracks and crevices of the WailingWall from Jerusalem to the 14th Street in New York, becoming an urban rite. These papers carry anonymous requests and prayer notes addressed directly to God.

The main lines of research in “Union Square Wall” are the antinomies “ written word/spoken word”, “secret prayer/public prayer”, “sacred ritual/urban ritual”. Though the prayers remain anonymous, the content will be made public at the end of the festival The sacred place will turn into a profane one, a wall built of soapboxes –an icon of consumer society- and finally, the inner word becomes a public speech.

The chosen venue to exhibit this project is Speakers Corner, 14th Street, Union Square. For many years Union Square Park was known as the City’s Speakers corner and it became the civic center for the city’s left wing, where the working class and immigrants gathered to make their voices heard. Through the first half of the twentieth century, Union Square was the scene of a myriad of demonstrations. The square was one of the spots where people could talk about anything with no censure. What started as a union of roadways became, symbolically, a good place to unite.

Consequently, A religious syncretism transformed into a profane fusion.