Copyright 2009
The YES! Association projects work to create favourable conditions for art workers whose practices contribute to the dismantling of structures of patriarchy, racism, and capitalism. In practice this means working with institutions to make change on structural levels; in concept this means playing with performance, fiction, and language to challenge institutions and provoke the change we want. The YES! Association is based in NY and Stockholm, and was initiated by Line S Karlström, Johanna Gustavsson, Malin Arnell, Anna Linder and Fia-Stina Sandlund. Collaborators have included Åsa Elzén, Kajsa Dahlberg, Henrik Andersson, Naiti Del Sante, and Hong-An Truong.
Recent events include:
(Dis)Agreements: the utility, effectiveness,
and problematics of categories
Presented by the YES! Association at making ourselves visible: a day-long project in feminist space-making
Sackler Center for Feminist Art in the Brooklyn Museum
We participated in making ourselves visible: a day-long project in feminist space-making initiated by Jen Kennedy and Liz Linden at the Sackler Center, Brooklyn Museum with the teach-in (Dis)agreements? – the utility, effectiveness, and problematics of categories.
We began the teach-in by making the following statement: We will start by making an announcement; We are very happy and excited to share with you that the Brooklyn Museum and the YES! Association have signed YES!’s Equality-Diversity Agreement #3. This has not yet been publicly announced, but we decided since this is such a special occasion to share our news with you already today. We will soon watch a short video* with footage from the actual signing of the agreement, followed by short interviews with Brooklyn Museum staff, artists and visitors about the anticipated effects of this. The different opinions expressed can be used as starting points in the discussion that will follow after the screening, when each of you will get a copy of the Equality-Diversity Agreement #3. Before watching the video we want to extend our deepest gratitude and thanks to everybody at the Brooklyn Museum for their involvement, especially Director Arnold Lehman and Judy Kim, one of the museum’s main curators for their courage, patience and support during the negotiations, thank you Melissa Chou, Brooklyn Museum’s lawyer who has worked so enthusiastically on the agreement, but most of all we want to thank the Sackler Center, all its staff and especially Elizabeth Sackler who really is the person who has made this possible and bridged the dialogue between YES! and the Brooklyn Museum.