Bread & Roses Now

Bread & Roses Now is AF's program of art projects addressing sexual and domestic violence.

Bread & Roses Now began in 1993 with the largest display of the Clothesline Projects continued with a 1994 multimedia exhibition by the Women's Action Coalition (WAC) at the Artists Foundation Gallery @ CityPlace. The next event under this program was a 1995 Valentine's Day State House event hosted by the lieutenant governor that featured Bob Markey's Witness to Violence public art project, which then traveled across the country. Markey's project and video returned to Boston in September 1997 to be on view in the new AF gallery/video room. Spring 1998's Bread & Roses Now project, "The Center Piece Project", co-curated by AF Advisory Board member Nick Capasso (Curator DeCordova Museum), involved 30 artists making center pieces that were auctioned for the 20th anniversary fund raiser for Casa Myrna Vazquez, the largest battered women's shelter in New England.

In 2002 and 2003 the Artists Foundation was among the key collaborators of "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?" an art project that addresses domestic violence that was presented in greater Lawrence and Boston.

Most recently the AF is collaborating with Jane Doe Inc, the statewide organization/coalition for sexual and domestic violence, to create a statewide online data base of artists working in all media (visual arts, film, poetry/spoken word, theater) who have a bodies of work that addresses domestic violence, rape, sexual assault, etc. This data base, to be hosted by the Artists Foundation, would be used by communities and service providers to find artists and for artists to find collaborators to work with to do programing on these issues. The goal is to unveil this for Domestic Violence Awareness Month in October 2005. This data base will be a prototype and will eventually include other multiple statewide databases that are targeted to certain communities and artists.