HOPE AGAINST HOPE:

A Weekend of Community and Song,
Co-Presented by CARA & the New York City AIDS Memorial

Featuring Batalá New York, BRUJAS, Christen Clifford, Paloma Contreras Lomas, Ines Doujak, Nimmi Gowrinathan, Loretta Ross, Pamela Sneed, The Blacksmiths, and more.

HOPE AGAINST HOPE extends beyond the individual artist’s practice and invites feminist poets, activists, musicians, and more to raise questions about how activist histories can inform radical presents. The weekend begins with a parade on May 4 at 2pm, co-presented by CARA and New York City AIDS Memorial. Weaving together pasts and futures of hope, participants form a chorus of voices calling for liberation from patriarchal oppression.

The parade opens at CARA with an invocation by poet Pamela Sneed, who will read work that honors the lives lost to AIDS through mourning and action. Her words will lead us into the streets, guided by the heart-beat of the parade: the percussion of Black-led, Afro Brazilian, all-women musical troupe Batalá New York. Joined by Brujas, a New York-based experimental union and skate collective, we will process towards St. Vincent’s Triangle (the New York City AIDS Memorial), which will act as a space for performances and gathering. At the memorial four artists from The Blacksmiths, a coalition of artists and organizers committed to using the arts to support direct action and civic engagement in the service of Black liberation and equity, will perform with vibraphone, trumpet, vocals, and percussion. Artist and writer Christen Clifford, whose work centers reproductive justice and organizing against gender-based violence, will perform. Free food will be available as an invitation for collective nourishment. The afternoon will be book-ended by a final offering from Sneed to close out the day.