Walk With Us! – September 7 and September 20, 2024
Procession of Angels for Radical Love and Unity is a collaborative initiative that brings together a multi-generational procession of people throughout New York City to envision how communities can gather as a collective force with a common purpose in turbulent times. Organized by Madison Square Park Conservancy in partnership with Harlem Art Park and conceived by artist María Magdalena Campos-Pons, Procession of Angels for Radical Love and Unity convenes participants to walk together from Harlem Art Park to Madison Square Park, tracing the steps of the past in order to build an inclusive future.
Across two mornings, seven stops along the route mark sites that were historically filled with agency, optimism, or trauma. Selected for their significance to New York City populations including Black, Cuban, and Cuban-American communities, each stop on the walk will be activated by poetry readings, culminating with an art-making workshop and music performances.
Participation is free; please register here for the date and event of your choosing.
Saturday, September 7, from 9 AM to 12:30 PM – First procession
Harlem Art Park: The procession convenes with welcome remarks by Campos-Pons and leadership from Harlem Art Park and Madison Square Park Conservancy, a poetry reading by Richard Blanco, and a performance by musician Zachary O’Farrill.
Dos Alas (Two Wings) Mural: A stop at this forty-foot mural representing revolutionaries Ernesto Che Guevara and Don Pedro Albizu Campos includes a poetry reading by Marina Ortiz.
El Museo del Barrio: The procession concludes with a poetry reading by 10-year-old New York poet-laureate Kayden Hern, and an art-making workshop including the creation of puppets, flags, and signs to be used for the procession on September 20. With participation by Zenén Calero Medina and Rubén Darío Salazar, Puppeteers, Teatro Guiñol Nacional (National Puppet Theater Company) of Cuba.
Participants are asked to wear blue, yellow, or white on September 7. Out of respect for the artist’s vision of inclusivity and global unity, we ask that you bring no banners, flags, signs, or banded materials.
Friday, September 20, from 9 AM to 2 PM – Second procession
Monument to José Julián Martí: The procession convenes at the south end of Central Park at this monument to the nineteenth-century Cuban writer, philosopher, and independence leader José Julián Martí, beginning with a reading of selected Martí writings by Pulitzer Prize–winning historian Dr. Ada Ferrer.
Gathering Site of the 1917 Silent Parade: This stop marks the site where ten thousand African Americans gathered on July 28, 1917 to protest racial violence, lynching, and discrimination by silently marching down Fifth Avenue from 55th Street to 23rd Street, setting the precedent for the peaceful demonstrations that would follow during the Civil Rights Movement. The stop includes a poetry reading by Patricia Spears Jones as well a moment of silence in tribute to the Silent Parade.
Former Site of the Colored Orphan Asylum: A poetry reading by Major Jackson honors the site of the first orphanage for Black children in the United States, which was burned to the ground on July 13, 1863, as a result of the eruption of racist violence during the New York City draft riots.
Madison Square Park: The procession concludes with a poetry reading by Willie Perdomo, a Carnegie Hall Citywide concert by acclaimed Afro-Cuban jazz singer Daymé Arocena, and a performance by distinguished musician Kamaal Malak.
Participants are asked to wear white on September 20. Out of respect for the artist’s vision of inclusivity and global unity, we ask that you bring no banners, flags, signs, or banded materials.
About the Artist
María Magdalena Campos-Pons (b. 1959, Matanzas, Cuba; lives and works in Nashville, Tennessee) creates work that addresses history, memory, gender, and religion, investigating the role of each in identity formation. Her practice intermixes photography, painting, sculpture, film, video, and performance.
Using herself and her Afro-Cuban relatives as subjects, Campos-Pons creates historical narratives that illuminate the spirits of people and places, present and past. She has participated in exhibitions and biennials internationally and has been the subject of solo exhibitions at major museums across the world, including the Brooklyn Museum and J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, which presented her traveling multimedia survey, María Magdalena Campos-Pons: Behold, in fall 2023. The exhibition goes on view at the Frist Art Museum in Nashville in September 2024. In 2023, Campos-Pons was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship.
She currently serves as the Cornelius Vanderbilt Endowed Chair and Professor of Fine Arts at Vanderbilt University, where she founded the Engine for Art, Democracy & Justice Program.
Information, illustrations, and photos courtesy of Madison Square Park Conservancy, María Magdalena Campos-Pons, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation., Cuba Sí, New York University, Vanderbilt University, Wikipedia, East Harlem Preservation, Debbie Quiñones, and other linked sources.