Sanctuary
is on the Horizon by Press Press

Printed Matter’s 2018 NY Art Book Fair & MoMA PS1

This project was first presented at MoMA PS1 as part of Printed Matter’s 2018 NY Art Book Fair in Queens, New York, Fall 2018

It traveled to Tufts University Art Galleries in Boston, MA, Winter 2019

Workshops to create the manifesto were held in collaboration with Wendy’s Subway in Brooklyn, NY and the Chicago Art Book Fair in Chicago, IL 

The Manifesto for Sanctuary-Building and Sanctuary-Keeping evolved out of Press Press’s 2018 publication, Sentiments: Expressions of Cultural Passage. The project gathered immigrant and immigrant-adjacent persons in Chicago, New York City, and Baltimore to collaborate on a manifesto that outlines various visions for making and protecting sanctuary. As Press Press explains,

This manifesto emerges as the targeting of immigrant communities and the violation of human rights continue: the likely ending of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), the refugee crisis across the globe, mass deportations, and pervasive institutional misconduct. Within this context, the word “sanctuary” has a multiplicity of meanings. Through an interrogation of the notion of “sanctuary,” this manifesto affirms the expertise of immigrants and immigrant-adjacent persons in imagining and building sanctuary.

Rather than seeing this collection of items as a concrete and final destination, we understand the process we’ve undertaken this past year as a point of departure. We recognize that some of the principles outlined here are not easily realizable, nor are they pragmatic. However, because of the collaborative process we’ve undertaken, we recognize this manifesto’s power in representing a collective vision we can reference as we make practical efforts toward accomplishing our goals.

As you go through the collection of items in the manifesto, we invite you to consider if and how sanctuary has manifested in your life and within your community. We invite you to be part of our process and contribute to answering our questions, or asking new ones that we have yet to think through. What is sanctuary? How can sanctuary be created? How can sanctuary be protected?”