New York Art Aids Congo Women

NEW YORK—Whoever said that the art world has lost its soul will be pleasantly surprised to hear about the silent auction held Thursday at Manhattan’s Cipriani restaurant. Women of the Congo, a New York–based nonprofit organization of professional women, teamed up with MFA students from Parsons the New School for Design for a fundraiser that will provide support and resources to women and girls in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The event, which highlighted the escalating levels of sexual violence against women in the Congo, featured an auction of artworks by a half-dozen young Parsons artists that earned over $10,000.

Urged on by Women of the Congo member Tara Taylor and Parsons Fine Arts chair Anthony Aziz, Parsons student Mary Nangah was inspired to organize the event after learning how sexual violence has become widespread in the Congo in recent years. Nangah donated several of her own paintings, among them a blaring-red portrait, and recruited classmates to participate in the auction, whose proceeds will go toward initiatives that help victims of rape in the Congo. The funds will be divided between City of Joy, a safe house for survivors of sexual violence in Bukavu, and Avocats Sans Frontières, a nonprofit group of lawyers who provide free legal aid to victims of sexual violence.

Besides showing deep generosity and an inspiring social conscience, the artists demonstrated a craftsmanship worthy of their high-flung concepts and dedication to a righteous cause. Though ready to discuss art-school dogma about “anti-post-feminism,” students like Suzanne K. Stroebe and Genevieve White were refreshingly pragmatic, and showed great enthusiasm about the intersection between art theory and social needs. White pointed out the “fine balance to stay true to what you’re doing but also to support the cause,” and her experimentation with the colors of Congo’s flag aptly navigated the space between fine art and political action. Lars Van Dooren, with his finely-tuned graphite drawings and interest in indecipherable languages and non-hierarchal systems, likewise realized utopian visions.

This writer was particularly excited about Meghan Snow’s offer of a pair of shoes custom-made from bubble wrap, similar to the pair she donated to the auction. But the evening’s most fascinating piece was certainly Angela Basile’s witty triptych Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, in which an image of a rather unappetizing sandwich was printed thrice, on three separately framed paper napkins. With their granular globules of festering cheese oozing from between slices of white bread, the sandwiches were intended to be at once humorous and a call to arms. The tension between these aims seemed like an apt metaphor for the difficult project that Women of the Congo and these Parsons students have undertaken: to appreciate the hardship that people are undergoing around the world while working and living in a New York City art world increasingly removed from everyday struggles.

To learn more about issues of sexual violence in the Congo, and to make a donation, visit womenofthecongo.com.