NOELLE LORRAINE WILLIAMS | Your collective is located in Jersey City, NJ one of the most ethnically diverse areas in the United States. Is their a common definition of beauty that spans across ethnicity, economics?

AGITATORS COLLECTIVE | Ido not know if there is a common definition of beauty that spans acrossethnicity and economics. That being said, many residents haveparticipated in our projects, from playing hopscotch in Grove StreetPATH Station to writing "who will save beauty?" in Vietnamese on theside of a wall. Many residents have taken photographs of our projectswith digital cameras, cell phones, disposable cameras. Most recently,we asked citizens in Jersey City to translation "love is all around" into their native tongue. We managed to gather more than thirty languages.

NOELLE LORRAINE WILLIAMS |While it seems that how people define beauty in the "private" domesticsphere is often where people think the business of art lies, you allplace an emphasis in the public sphere.   How do you feel we can createan environment that is rigorously beautiful while being open to a"democracy" of visions of what beauty is and can be?

AGITATORS COLLECTIVE | InAgitators Collective, ideas are freely shared and labor evenlydistributed. We specifically choose materials and objects that capturethe culture of Jersey City, such as candy from the corner bodega, Christmas lights from a 99 cent store on Newark Avenue,and found objects taken from a vacant lot underneath an overpass. Thelocations we choose are either overrun with commuter traffic or inremote corners of the city.

AgitatorsCollective seeks to involve the public in our installations. The pieceshave ranged from 8,000 marshmallow peeps on the stairwell of a citypark to a 100 foot circle in turmeric in a parking lot, and thepublic's spontaneous reactions have spurred our future works.

AgitatorsCollective's works transform downtrodden sites into areas of vibrantcreative activity. We cultivate life into dead public spaces to makepeople - particularly those people who have neither had the opportunitynor the luxury to set foot in an art gallery or museum - think abouttheir space differently. 

Fromcreating a hopscotch court at a busy train station to painting "whowill save beauty?" in over thirty languages on the side of an abandonedbuilding, we seek to involve the community in our artwork, andtransform neighborhood sites into vibrant playgrounds and beautifulexhibition spaces.

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"We arranged the Peeps in the morning... drove back to
document the project in the early afternoon. While we
were there, a man - disheveled, unkempt - walked over
to the Peeps. A few were scattered across the
cobblestone street. This man bent down to his hands
and knees, and replaced the wayward Peeps to their
original place. Then he walked away. This is my
definition of beauty." - Agitators Collective
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NOELLE LORRAINE WILLIAMS | Isthere a particular reason that many of your projects utilize multiples,repetition and bright patterns?  Is there any relationship totraditional textiles?

AGITATORS COLLECTIVE | Weoften focus on downtrodden areas that have fallen into neglect ordereliction. The sites range from vacant lots and abandoned blacktops,empty storefronts and concrete slabs beneath

Wearranged Christmas lights to spell "beauty" in Arabic in four vacantstorefront windows across the street from City Hall in December 2006.We asked an Egyptian friend to translate beauty into Arabic. Before weinstalled the lights, we went into a bodega on Grove Streetto see if the translation was correct. It wasn't. The clerk translatedthe beauty in Arabic. His written translation became AgitatorsCollective's guide in the installation. 

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Biography - AGITATORS COLLECTIVE
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Agitators Collective, a collaborative project, was co-founded in 2006 in Jersey City, New Jerseyby Triple A, Sweet Tooth, and JellyFish. Agitators Collective createssite related installations in urban locales that have fallen intoneglect or dereliction in Jersey City, New Jersey.

Agitators Collective: Triple A aka AAA; Sweet Tooth aka Bubsie O'Malley aka B.O.M; Mick Night; Jellyfish aka M.I.A., etc.

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Links

Agitators Collective
http://www.agitatorscollective.com/
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