In 2019, I collaborated with sports scholar Dr. Akilah Carter-Francique and San José State’s Institute for the Study of Sport, Society & Social Change to build Wall of Song's second collaborative project, FEELING GOOD. This participatory, durational project invited hundreds of fans to sing 'Feeling Good'—the song made famous by Nina Simone—as a series of collaborative and participatory art and live half-time performances dedicated to amplifying voices in women's sports' search for equity, joy and more inclusive community—particularly for BIPOC, non-binary, and transgender athletes.

The project grew over several years together and expanded to include over two dozen campus, community, and cultural affinity partners and a series of evolving video installations, limited edition prints, sculptures, and photo-based works (examples below).

Thanks to all who added their voices and made this project possible! For more information on our events, collaborators, and calls-to-action, please visit www.wallofsongproject.com.

“Now that my ladder’s gone / I must lie down where all the ladders start / In the foul rag-and-bone shop of the heart.” 
—W. B. Yeats

Nov. 4 – Dec. 2 | Root Division, San FranciscoOpening Reception: Nov. 11, 2017, 7-10pm
Gallery Hours (or by appointment): Wednesday-Saturday, 2-6pm

Love & Longing shares descents into the unknown, artistic responses that perpetuate their own kind of fulfillment—“when the dark becomes another kind of lover” (John Tarrant). Through trying circumstances, a multiplicity of entanglements, and cascading heartbreaks, the works in Love & Longing share a sensibility fraught with loss, and reactions layered over time.

The exhibition includes works that chip—or pound—away at the wall separating art and life—that challenge, complicate, intensify, confront, and grapple with engagement and connection. Drawing upon a wide range of media and conceptual strategies—from the unflinchingly serious to the deadpan, from one-on-one to participatory encounters—the art works selected visually and aurally engage with unlikely, ungraspable hope, and a call for radical empathy and deepening relationships, in our own dark time.

VIEW LOVE AND LONGING CURATORIAL ESSAY

List of Artists:

Moir Clements (1924-2015) with Mel Day and Laurence UptonMark Clintberg
Miriam Dym
Carissa Potter Carlson
Jonn Herschend
Mark Stock (1951-2014) in collaboration with Gary Janis
Chris Komater
Kija LucasLinda Mary Montano
Jillian McDonald
EfrenAve in collaboration with Pedro Alvarez Perez
Joel Daniel Phillips
Peggy Phelan
Dario Robleto
Welcome Project

and a curated video sampler by in collaboration with
Jaime Cortez, Michelle Wilson, Christopher Scott, Nadav Assor and other guest artists TBA.

Select installation views (photo credits: Kija Lucas)

An evolving video and choral ensemble and performance of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah
Organized by artists Mel Day & Michael Namkung
wallofsongproject.com

Originally co-founded by artists Mel Day and Michael Namkung, Wall of Song Project began as a participatory, evolving video installation and live singing event that invited people—no matter their ability to carry a tune—to record themselves singing Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah. Hundreds of participants’ faces were layered together into a growing democratic chorus and video installation—such that no one voice or face stood out. In this time of great unknowing and uncertainty, this was a more permeable kind of wall that brought people together.

Launched on Inauguration Day (2017) in Washington, D.C. and at San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, Wall of Song has been shared widely, recently with over 500 live and virtually present voices at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, with support from multiple organizations, donors and participants. Thank you for supporting Wall of Song!

Doxology, 10 years later (+/-), is an evolving, multi-channel video project depicting each member of Day’s large family humming a hymn in essentially the same way every decade. The latest two-channel version was filmed in 2005 and 2015. Day plans to film her family humming a third time 10 years from now—and again, 20 years on, etc. This video and audio family portrait is a meditation on the ungraspable and shifting language of belief and doubt and the artist’s own ability to continue to make work. An exploration of individual and collective transformation on a number of levels—family, gallery/film, and curatorial relationships—absences will signify those no longer with us or perhaps those who refuse to or can’t participate. Technology changes and Day’s own growth as an artist will inevitably alter each successive screening/installation.

Each family member is filmed individually and left alone while humming. Each person is asked to hum the hymn as he or she would sing it. Layered together, their voices are both dissonant and harmonious. It is hard to tell when one person stops humming and another begins. A half-language emerges, somewhere between knowing and not knowing.

Featuring (in order of appearance): Rossalyn Day, Rachel Day, Mel Day, Bethany Day, Alan Day, Alasdair Day, Roderick Day (2015) Giles Day, Lynne Day, Rowena Day, Catriona Day