Join us on April 29 for the opening of “Mulberry Bend,” a group exhibition with Canal Street Research Association @canal_street_research , David L. Johnson @david_johnso , Sidian Liu @ccinstar , and Paul Pfeiffer @pmp2021 .
The exhibition is curated by Dylan Seh-Jin Kim @dylanskim within Protocinema Emerging Curator Series 2025-2026, mentored by Mari Spirito @spiritomari , Jessica Kwok @jessicaskwok , and Christopher Y. Lew @christopherylew , and in collaboration with ISS Storefront for Ideas @storefrontforideas .
Taking its title from “Mulberry Bend,” a name historically used to describe the area surrounding Mulberry Street in Manhattan’s Chinatown for its bend in the road, since 1755, this exhibition explores the relationship between art’s autonomy, use value, and civic function by responding to contemporary social struggles facing the community.
Emerging from a need to reckon with the public conditions that shape life in the neighborhood, Mulberry Bend considers how artistic practices might generate modes of civic engagement without reverting to the didactic or extractive models that have historically accompanied social practice.
Poster design @karefullee
In “照拂 reflect/brush,” Sidian Liu @ccinstar meditates on invisibilized caregiving alongside its societal and familial expectations to sustain the conditions for everyday life. She invites those who reside in Chinatown and self-identify as caregivers to participate. The artist defines caregiving broadly to encompass the performance of reproductive activities across domestic, communal, and professional contexts, all devoted to caring for others.
In her temporary salon, she offers participants free haircuts and the option to have their oral histories recorded. Following the haircutting sessions, Liu creates cleaning tools from the collected hair and leads a series of public brooming performances alongside the playback of the participants’ stories.
Sidian Liu is an artist, translator, yarner, and nest builder based in New York City. Using ”housewife skills,“ she makes social relationships to facilitate trust and intimacy from a respectful distance, exploring pathways to further solidarity in our challenging times. Living in flux as a Chinese woman and an immigrant in the U.S., her works often take forms in images, performance, light-weight installations, and socially-engaged projects.
Installation shots @ccinstar
In the “Loiter” series, David L. Johnson @david_johnso de-contextualizes the hostile architecture, exclusionary designs created on the built environment, surrounding nearby standpipes, extracting them directly and repurposing them as sculptures.
David L. Johnson is an artist who lives and works in New York City. Johnson‘s work focuses on the urban built environment, pinpointing moments of slippage between public and private property. His practice uses photography, video, found and stolen objects, and installation to examine the politics, histories, aesthetics, and forms of use that define contemporary urban space.
Through this act of guerilla intervention, Johnson spotlights the violence and severity of such designs, created to prevent people from sitting or otherwise occupying a space. The artist’s contribution simultaneously exists in public space through the absence of the hostile architecture, providing a material outcome via their removal.
Courtesy Fanta-MLN, Milan, Theta New York
@fanta_mln@theta.nyc
Installation shots @ccinstar
Canal Street Research Association (CSRA) @canal_street_research is a fictional office founded in 2020 in an empty storefront on Canal Street, New York City’s counterfeit epicenter.
On May 26, CSRA will work with artist Siyan Wong @artistsiyanwong and SureWeCan @surewecannyc , a non-profit recycling center, community space and sustainability hub in Brooklyn, to set up a temporary redemption center that advocates raising the canner wage and pays five cents (set in 1982) per per can to ten cents.
Founded by @Shanzhai_Lyric (Ming Lin @gourdtimes and Alex Tatarsky @tartar.biz ), CSRA centers the local legacies of gleaning, from the ragpickers of nearby Ragpickers’ Court (where Columbus Park is today) to present-day canners and trash pickers. Conducting their research within a site-responsive office, CSRA foregrounds the under-recognized and under-compensated labor of local recyclers as ecological engineers operating at the margins.
Installation shots @ccinstar
On view now:
Protocinema Mulberry Bend
📅Thursdays - Sundays 12:00 - 6:00 p.m.
📍Hosted at: ISS @storefrontforideas , 127 Walker Street, Chinatown, New York
Protocinema, presents Mulberry Bend, a group exhibition with Canal Street Research Association (CSRA) @canal_street_research , David L. Johnson @david_johnso , Sidian Liu @ccinstar , and Paul Pfeiffer @pmp2021 , curated by Dylan Seh-Jin Kim @dylanskim within Protocinema Emerging Curator Series 2025-2026, mentored by Mari Spirito @spiritomari , Jessica Kwok @jessicaskwok , and Christopher Y. Lew @christopherylew .
Taking its title from Mulberry Bend, a name historically used to describe the area surrounding Mulberry Street in Manhattan’s Chinatown for its bend in the road, since 1755, this exhibition explores the relationship between art’s autonomy, use value, and civic function by responding to contemporary social struggles facing the community.
Came across ourselves when reading “7 Shows to See During Frieze New York 2026”! Apparently you should come see our show Mulberry Bend during the New York Art Week ☺️
Thank you @friezeofficial for the feature, and @jonathan.odden for the write up!
📅 April 30 - June 7
⏰ Thursdays - Saturdays, 12:00 - 6:00pm
📍 127 Walker Street
🔗 /article/critics-guide-frieze-new-york-2026
Protocinema presents Mulberry Bend, exhibition curated by Dylan Seh-Jin Kim @dylanskim as a part of the 2026 Protocinema Emerging Curator Series (PECS).
Special thanks to Mari Spirito @spiritomari , Jessica Kwok @jessicaskwok , Christopher Lew @christopherylew for your mentorship, and @storefrontforideas for hosting 💫
Artists:
Canal Street Research Association @canal_street_research
David L. Johnson @david_johnso
Sidian Liu @ccinstar
Paul Pfeiffer @pmp2021
📅 April 30 - June 7
⏰ Thursdays - Saturdays, 12:00 - 6:00pm
📍 127 Walker Street
Installation shots @ccinstar
Sharing more lovely images from last week’s opening - thank you all for coming!
Come see Protocinema’s newest exhibition “Mulberry Bend,” and stay tuned for our programmings 🤓
April 30 - June 7
Thursdays - Saturdays, 12:00 - 6:00pm
127 Walker Street
Thank you everyone for coming to the opening of Protocinema’s newest exhibition “Mulberry Bend” - we loved having you there!
Stay tuned for the upcoming programmings 💫
The exhibition is now open:
April 30 - June 7
Thursdays - Saturdays, 12:00 - 6:00pm
127 Walker Street
See you tomorrow! Mulberry Bend opens on Wednesday April 29 💫 Curator @Dylanskim will give preview walk-throughs at 4:00pm & 5:00pm.
Reception: 6:00pm-8:00pm
127 Walker Street
Can’t wait to see you 🫶
Congratulations to Abbas Akhavan @abbasakhavan on representing the Canada Pavilion at the 60th Venice Biennale in 2026 @labiennale ! 🇨🇦✨
Abbas has been an integral part of the Protocinema story, and we are honored to have grown alongside him through several major commissions.
In 2020, Abbas created a new video and sculpture “Spill”for our multi-city exhibition, “A Few In Many Places.”
This was followed in 2021 by “sping,” a major new sculpture commissioned for our 10th-anniversary exhibition, “Once Upon a Time Inconceivable.”
Huge congratulations to Abbas and the @NatGalleryCan on this incredible milestone! We are thrilled to witness the evolution of Abbas’s vision over the years.
#AbbasAkhavan #CanadaPavilion #VeniceBiennale2026 #Protocinema #NationalGalleryOfCanada
