Daniela Mayer

It would hurt us – were we awake – presents twelve international artists whose works drift along the mutable edge of sleep and waking life, where inner sanctuaries are unsettled by invisible architectures of external power. Shaped by today’s pervasive climate of ambient anxiety, the exhibition reflects on how sites of rest and refuge—mental, bodily, or built—are rendered precarious by elusive, often existential forces. Across media, the artists explore these fragile barriers, navigating the tension between safety, vulnerability, and the subconscious. Curated by Daniela Mayer. On view at NARS Foundation, opening August 29, 2025, 6:00-8:00 p.m. @_d.mayer @narsfoundation @gillgatfield @gigilavolpe @aldelorenzo @jaydenashleyartwork @kayyoon @tony_zdf @kiminii @doreen_chanwingyan @shivanimines @cass.yao @maya.smira @liz.chang_ Image: Giorgia Volpe, Impermanent Paths #1, 2025, Digital collage.

Made by Brazilian artist Hélio Oiticica (1937–1980) during his self-exile to New York in collaboration with Brazilian filmmaker Neville D’Almeida (born 1941), the 1973 series of Bloco-Experiências in Cosmococa–Programa in Progress, or Cosmococas, operate on multiple levels to transform pop and underground culture into a psychedelic experience. Part of Oiticica’s larger series of quasi-cinemas, each installation features cacophonic soundscapes, fragmentary projections, cocaine drawings, and tactile elements meant to engage the senses. For each of the five original Cosmococas, the artists crafted two sets of instructions: one for public institutional presentations and, in an anti-elitist effort to democratize the series, another for display in private homes. Presented in the United States for the first time in the work’s fifty-year history, Cosmic Shelter debuts the private versions of CC2 Onobject and CC3 Maileryn, reimagining the gallery as a space for individual relaxation and play. Opening: October 12, 2023, 6:30-9 PM, Leubsdorf Gallery, 132 E 68th St, New York, NY Dates: October 12, 2023 - March 30, 2024 Curated by Daniela Mayer @_d.mayer The exhibition was developed in conjunction with a two-semester independent study by Hunter College MA Art History students Thais Bignardi, Rowan Diaz-Toth, and Angelica Pomar @deadlytheremin @darkdesigncatalog @anjuleca Special thanks to Neville D’Almeida, Cesar Oiticica Filho, and the Projeto Hélio Oiticica for their collaboration. @nevilledalmeida @cesaroiticicafilho @projeto_heliooiticica @huntercollegeartgalleries . . . . . . . . . . . . #carioca #rioarte #newyork #heliooiticica #brazil #cosmococa #typewriter #gallery #cuny #opening #exhibition #marilynmonroe #cosmic #shelter #cosmicshelter #art #artoftheday #artistsoninstagram

OPENING NEXT WEEK We’re pleased to announce Christina Barrera’s solo exhibition, “Para Todos Todo, Free in the Open Air,” opening next week, Wednesday, July 24. The exhibition is curated by Daniela Mayer and will be on view from July 24 to August 17. Christina Barrera’s multidisciplinary creative practice engages directly with political movements and injustices, from the detainment of immigrants and refugees at the United States-Mexico border to the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests to the ongoing crisis in Gaza. Using printmaking, weaving, drawing, and sculpture, her embodied artmaking acts as catharsis from the daily inequities she encounters, which in her words, she suffers as cognitively dissonant “psychic breaks.” This will be Barrera’s first solo exhibition in New York City. Detail: You Can Only Burn a Faggot Once, 2024 Pastel and charcoal on paper 29.5 x 32 in Courtesy of the artist @_ghostina_ @_d.mayer

Shadow Selves. « We all live in each other’s Shadow » credit : Andrew Schwartz and Art Photo Biz, and tag @artephotobiz . Thanks to @narsfoundation @conseilartscan @lecalq @villequebec Tomorrow is the LAST DAY to experience the magnificent exhibitions taking over our gallery and project space! It Would Hurt Us — Were We awake featuring the Season III, 2025 International Residency Artists curated by NARS Curatorial Fellow Daniela Mayer (@_d.mayer ) and AiR Alumnus, Swing by our gallery hours from 12 - 5 PM tomorrow, see you there! 🌟

Very grateful for the opportunity to be Curatorial Fellow at @narsfoundation and to collaborate with the incredible 2025 Season III International Residency Artists on It would hurt us – were we awake – It would hurt us – were we awake – presents twelve international artists whose works drift along the mutable edge of sleep and waking life, where inner sanctuaries are unsettled by invisible architectures of external power. Shaped by today’s pervasive climate of ambient anxiety, the exhibition reflects on how sites of rest and refuge—mental, bodily, or built—are rendered precarious by elusive, often existential forces. Across media, the artists explore these fragile barriers, navigating the tension between safety, vulnerability, and the subconscious, reminding us that dreaming itself is a political act in a world where rest is never promised. Read / download the Artists’ Dream Zines at /ReadDreamZines If you haven’t seen it yet, tomorrow, September 16, is your last chance to experience the show. Come dream with us one final time. Featuring work by: @aldelorenzo @jaydenashleyartwork @kayyoon @gillgatfield @gigilavolpe @tony_zdf @kiminii @doreen_chanwingyan @shivanimines @cass.yao @maya.smira @liz.chang Installation images by Andrew Schwartz and @artphotobiz Images courtesy of @narsfoundation

Check out my essay “The Queer Politics of Hélio Oiticica’s Babylonian Cinema” in the latest edition of @art_style_magazine . Thank you to the editors, EIC Christiane Wagner, and the peer-reviewers for publishing my work! As always, I am forever grateful to the @projeto_heliooiticica for their support of my research. As an avid believer in open-access, I am so excited to be published in this journal alongside so many wonderful scholars. Thank you again to @artstyle_projects . Link in bio to read.

Time is an illusion, but it does fly. One year ago today “Cosmic Shelter: Hélio Oiticica and Neville D’Almeida’s Private Cosmococas”opened at the Leubsdorf Gallery @huntercollegeartgalleries . Although the exhibition wrapped on March 30th, the journey continues—explore the programming, watch artist performances, download our free zine (it becomes a poster) and check out the exhibition labels (in English, Spanish, and Portuguese) on my website and the Leubsdorf Gallery site. (Links in bio). A huge thank you to the @projeto_heliooiticica , @cesaroiticicafilho , and @nevilledalmeida for their invaluable collaboration and support. My gratitude forever goes to the fantastic gallery and curatorial team that brought this supra-sensorial exhibition to life: @okaymilly @birbiebetty @liznaiden @deadlytheramin @darkdesigncatalog @anjuleca and our dedicated art handlers @robotshiba @automaticcowboy @soursilence amongst others. And another special thank you to supporters @lisson_gallery and @kaeli_deane . Installation images by @argenisphoto . . . . . . . . . . #contemporaryart #modernart #70s #gimmeshelter #art #arthistory #exhibition #brazil #newyork

Tomorrow, Saturday, August 17th is your last day to see “Christina Barrera: Para Todos Todo, Free in the Open Air” at MAMA Projects. Don’t miss your chance to grab a beautiful (and free!) zine created by @_ghostina_ and lose yourself in her chalk-pastel landscapes, where anthropomorphic processioners march in an imagined borderless land. 12-6 PM at MAMA Projects, 224 W 30th St, suite 604, NY, NY. From the zine: DM: By generating work that looks more fantastical and exist in this imagined land, you’ve created an avenue for viewers to come to these [distressing] issues sideways and reopen themselves to thinking about these problems in a way that is not so overly sensitive. These pieces override a defensive response, where viewers may automatically reject uncomfortable information because of a built-in need to protect themselves from psychic breaks. Sharing both hope and horror simultaneously is so important. The works in Para Todos Todo are truly about every battle for liberation and every dream that anyone has ever had to be free and to be allowed to be themselves in whatever context. CB: I don’t know what to say to that, except that I don’t want to create completely utopian work. I don’t think it’s useful to think there is a state of perfection. Yes, you can be free, but that freedom has to be continually maintained and you’re still going to be anxious about how things are going. The works in Para Todos Todo are not pressed into service by any one movement. I’m not making direct calls for any particular kind of revolution or revolutionary tactic in the work, but at the same time the only way to imagine something different is to have an alternative version to offer. My mushroom frog-person walking through the prairie is not believable per se, but you need to have these imaginaries, ambitious, or even fantastical ones, otherwise there’s nothing to move towards. You need to imagine what the future looks like in order to go there or to start moving towards there. . . . . . . . #newyork #art #artist #nyc #drawing

It has been an honor to curate Christina Barrera’s first NYC solo show “Para Todos Todo, Free in the Open Air” at MAMA Projects. Meditating on the chronodissonant, cyclical nature of liberation struggles, Barrera’s new series of chalk-pastel drawings and sculptures express both her complex emotions about the present and hopes for the future. @_ghostina_ A special thanks to Berto Santana for his collaboration and support of this show! @bertosantana “Para Todos Todo, Free in the Open Air” opens Wednesday, July 24, 6-8 PM, at MAMA Projects @mamaprojects.co . A limited number of zines created by Christina will be available (for free!) at the exhibition. The exhibition runs until Saturday, August 17th. See you there! 1. Installation view of several works in “Para Todos Todo, Free in the Open Air” at MAMA Projects. 2. Christina Barerra standing in “Para Todos Todo, Free in the Open Air” at MAMA Projects. 2. Detail of “I Build With Bricks Laid Down Before I Was Born” 2024, steel. Fabrication assistance by Michael Clayton. 3. Detail of “I’m Not Looking For Work But I Wanna Talk to You” 2024, Inkjet prints, Risograph prints (site specific installation of unique prints).i

Please join me for the final programming event of the Cosmic shelter exhibition. March 23, 2024 1:00 PM Curator Tour 2:30 PM Curator Talk (Hybrid) “COCAINE Neither Toxic Nor Water: Reevaluating Cocaine’s Role in the Cosmococas”. RSVP at tinyurl.com/CosmicShelterTour for the Zoom link.

Please join me for the final programming event of the Cosmic Shelter exhibition. March 23, 2024 1:00 PM Curator Tour 2:30 PM Curator Talk (Hybrid) “COCAINE Neither Toxic Nor Water: Reevaluating Cocaine’s Role in the Cosmococas”. RSVP at tinyurl.com/CosmicShelterTour for the Zoom link.

1pm + 3pm March 16 at @spectaclenyc ... In collaboration with the 𝘾𝙤𝙨𝙢𝙞𝙘 𝙎𝙝𝙚𝙡𝙩𝙚𝙧: 𝙃𝙚́𝙡𝙞𝙤 𝙊𝙞𝙩𝙞𝙘𝙞𝙘𝙖 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙉𝙚𝙫𝙞𝙡𝙡𝙚 𝘿’𝘼𝙡𝙢𝙚𝙞𝙙𝙖’𝙨 𝙋𝙧𝙞𝙫𝙖𝙩𝙚 𝘾𝙤𝙨𝙢𝙤𝙘𝙤𝙘𝙖𝙨 exhibition—on view until March 30th at the Hunter College Art Galleries—please join us at 124 s. 3rd street for a beyond-rare chance to see the first two films directed by Brazilian filmmaker, artist and holy madman Neville D’almeida. Each screening will be followed by a remote discussion with D’Almeida, moderated by Cosmic Shelter curator Daniela Mayer. 𝗝𝗔𝗥𝗗𝗜𝗠 𝗗𝗘 𝗚𝗨𝗘𝗥𝗥𝗔 (WAR GARDEN) dir. Neville D’almeida, 1967 Brazil. 92 mins. In Brazilian Portuguese with English subtitles. Set in Rio de Janeiro under the military dictatorship in the 1960s, JARDIM DE GUERRA follows a young leftist Edson and his love interest, aspiring filmmaker Maria, played by Joel Barcellos and Maria do Rosário, respectively. The plot takes a dark turn when Edson, in an attempt to raise fast money for Maria’s film, is baselessly arrested and tortured for his suspected involvement in a plot to overthrow the regime. 𝗠𝗔𝗡𝗚𝗨𝗘 𝗕𝗔𝗡𝗚𝗨𝗘 dir. Neville D’almeida, 1971 Brazil. 62 mins. No dialogue. D’Almeida originally imagined MANGUE BANGUE as a collaboration with Oiticica, but the latter’s transcontinental move led D’Almeida to complete the film himself, editing the project in London to avoid censorship. The silent film’s story loosely follows a stockbroker as he devolves into a primitive creature that raves between Rio de Janeiro’s financial center and Mangue, the neighboring red-light district, before disappearing into the jungle. Blurring the line between documentary and fiction, D’Almeida integrated long sequences of actors and real people performing common tasks, from laundry to drug use, to capture the ordinary lives of criminal and marginalized figures in Brazil.