Play Cousins
A Circle of Sound Experience
Play along with Play Cousins, virtually or in- person at Hera Gallery’s game portal. Watch the Play Cousins Instructions Video for more details.
Read more about Play Cousins in The Independent
The Circle of Sound was conceived in January of 2021 as an experiment in place-keeping. The seven artists that form this collective were brought together by an invitation to participate in collaborative world-building, where joy, healing, and potential futures are centered. Through monthly gatherings, as well as sharing resources and prompts, Play Cousins was born.
Play Cousins opens Saturday, July 31st with live performances and interactive art from 10am- 4pm. A closing reception will be held Sunday, August 29th from 3-5 pm at Hera Gallery.
Play Cousins Game Instructions
Play along in person OR virtually through the QR codes and Gallery Portal.
Cicely Carew
Boston-based, L.A.-raised artist Cicely Carew spent her formative years in Los Angeles, CA. She recently completed her MFA from Lesley Art + Design in Cambridge, MA. Directly after graduation, she had a solo exhibition at Simmons University, Trustman Gallery, in 2020. She actively exhibits her work in galleries and was recently featured in the Newport Art Museum’s 2020-21 exhibition “Call & Response. Cicely was the featured interview and artwork for the Boston Art Review 's No. 6 issue (2020). She also creates public art installations around the Boston area, including a major 5,000 sq ft. public art project in the Prudential Center curated by Now + There (2021) and another commission for Peloton in New York City (2021). Carew was recently awarded the 2021 St. Botolph Club Foundation Emerging Artist award for painting. Carew is an educator and will teach workshops for the New Art Center and be the Artist in Residence for the 2021-22 academic year at Shady Hill School. She will be exhibiting new work for a solo exhibition at the Fitchburg Art Museum in fall 2022. Carew currently resides in Cambridge, MA, with her son.
To learn more about Cicely’s practice, visit CicelyCarew.com
Follow @cicelycarew on IG
Becci Davis
Becci Davis was born on a military installation in Georgia named after General Henry L. Benning of the Confederate States Army. She is a Rhode Island based visual artist who works across disciplines. Becci finds inspiration mining the archive and exploring natural and cultural landscapes. In Providence, she is a member of the WARP Collective, AS220, and Dirt Palace Public Projects communities.
To learn more about Becci’s practice, visit beccidavis.com
Follow @bdavissynergy on IG
Rachel Hughes
View Rachel's LIVE Opening Day Performance HERE!
Rachel Hughes is an artist of Afro-Caribbean descent, a woman who had a type of boyhood, and an expert at savoring delights. She is a writer, poet, playwright, game creator, visual artist, and stage performer. Rachel is, by name and by play, the Queen of Diamonds.
To learn more about Rachel’s practice, visit rachelhugheswrites.com
Follow @croyland on IG
View Rachel’s LIVE Closing Reception Performance HERE!
Janaya Kizzie
Janaya Kizzie is an artist, writer and historian working in Providence. Kizzie considers each work a binding of some kind, in the literal and esoteric sense. Often invoking the tropes of the horror genre, Kizzie experiments with narrative, worldbuilding, and non-linear time. Kizzie's work has been exhibited by the RISD Museum, the Jamestown Arts Center, and the New Bedford Art Museum.
Play along with these QR codes!
To learn more about Janaya’s practice, visit hiddenherepress.wordpress.org
Follow @hiddenherepress on IG
Jazzmen Lee Johnson
Jazzmen Lee-Johnson is a visual artist, scholar, composer, and curator. Her practice centers on the interplay of animation, printmaking, music, and dance, informed by a yearning to understand how our current circumstance is tethered to the trauma of the past. Through her visual, sonic, and movement investigations across time and technology she disrupts and asserts ideas of history, body, liberation, and otherness. She is always eager to radically reimagine the possibilities of the present by disturbing fixed notions of the past, and conjuring a future that might come to be.
To learn more about Jazz’s practice, jazzmenleejohnson.com
Follow @jazzleejohnson on IG
Shey Rivera Rios
Listen to Rivera Rios talk about their work on Instagram LIVE! During the Play Cousins Closing Reception!
Shey Rivera Ríos (they/them) is an interdisciplinary artist and cultural strategist that thrives when expressing themselves through immersive live performance, digital media, installation, and poetry/narrative. Their artistic creations span a myriad of topics, from home to capitalism to queerness and magic, and this often manifests through intentional processes of collaboration. Rivera was born and raised in the island of Borikén and has been living in Providence, RI -land of the Narragansett and Wampanoag peoples- for over a decade.
To learn more about Shey’s practice, visit sheyrivera.com
Follow @sheyriv on IG and Facebook
Kei Soares Cobb
Kei Soares Cobb is a cape verdean-american father, fruit farmer, fugitive afro-futurist artist-healer working in collaboration with the forest, water spirits, and liminal spaces to build living sanctuary for the delinquent and dispossessed. Kei’s recent work has been featured at Trinity Repertory Theatre, Jamestown Art Center, RISD Museum, and is presently in performance-process with choreographer nora chipaumire.
To learn more about Kei’s practice, visit keisoarescobb.com & newworldhealingcenter.com
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