About
Like all material culture, items of clothing and fashion have “social lives”—biographies containing the unique stories that have produced these objects. Clothing and fashion connect people across space and time, physically and symbolically. The curatorial process that created this exhibition resulted from a three-year collaboration between Bard Graduate Center and two courses at CUNY LaGuardia Community College.
Each fall, Professor Filip Stabrowski’s Cultural Anthropology students from LaGuardia selected and studied objects of clothing and fashion to which they felt connected. The artifacts they chose span the globe from Japan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Tibet, Mexico, Colombia, Yemen, and Ivory Coast to Albania, Suriname, Puerto Rico, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and the United States, reflecting the diversity of New York City and LaGuardia. The students’ papers and photos, included in this exhibition, attempted to go behind the label and fabric, exploring the social relationships required to produce, consume, dispose of, and reuse these powerful objects. Each spring, a new group of students in Professor Liena Vayzman’s Urban Study: Art and Society course curated the presentation of these objects to the public by writing the object descriptions and participating in the design of the exhibition. The Art and Society students created self-portrait artworks as part of a workshop co-sponsored by Transformative Learning in the Humanities at CUNY and wrote Artist Statements to present their own voices and identities.
Connecting Threads invites you, the viewer, to enter into the social lives of these objects, to write yourselves into their biographies.
Dr. Filip Stabrowski, Associate Professor, Anthropology, Social Science Department, LaGuardia Community College, The City University of New York
Dr. Liena Vayzman, Associate Professor, Fine Arts, Humanities Department, LaGuardia Community College, The City University of New York
Faculty Mentors, Connecting Threads: Fashioning Identity in a Global World
2020 Cohort
LIST OF PARTICIPATING STUDENTS FROM CUNY LAGUARDIA COMMUNITY COLLEGE
SSA 101 Honors Cultural Anthropology, Professor Filip Stabrowski
Fall 2019
Sumi Aktar
Sam Brown
Natalia Cortes
Maria Doria
Angelise Freeman
Hanan Hassani
Jean-Pierre Hernandez
Edward Molina
Tenzin Pelchok
Monano Pierre-Paul
Sarina Ranjit
Steven Saputra
Dolma Sherpa
Kiersten Walker
Owen White
HUN 192 Urban Study: Art and Society, Professor Liena Vayzman
Spring 2020
Prestasia Aldridge
Anju Allo
Rajan Chaudhary
Andre Dunkley
Josephine Elumeze
Stephanie Flores
Juancamilo Florez
Cristal Grey
Jeancarlo Gutierrez
Nusrat Jahan
Amal Khalil
Hunain Khan
Sony Khanal
Jose Luis Lobo Lara
Sharmin Momtaj
Kerwin Phillips
Sonia Sultana
Aung Myo Thet
Jessica Toomey
Magaly Villano
Flora White
Jason Wright
2021 Cohort
LIST OF PARTICIPATING STUDENTS FROM CUNY LAGUARDIA COMMUNITY COLLEGE
SSA101 Cultural Anthropology (Honors and Regular), Professor Filip Strabrowski
Fall 2020
Yesmeri Caba
Virginie Guebie
Tenzin Gaden
Kiara Garcia
Jennifer Gonzalez
David Chen
Christopher Sorrentini
Alondra Reyes
Yakelin Manzanares
Sarally Maldonado
Sara Perez
Numan Khalid
Matthew Rodriguez
Kalpana Adhikari
Jonghyuk Im
Hayate Hosenji
Gabriela Concepcion
Carolyn Smith
Akrm Ahmed
HUN192 Urban Study: Art and Society (Honors), Professor Liena Vayzman
Spring 2021
Alvaro Chavarriaga
Bekhruz Davronov
Edgar Daniel Herrera
John Kohler
JunHui (Erik) Chen
Kristen Chan
Leuvy Alvarez
Lucas Neira
Mohamed Marzouk
Mosamad Karun Nahar
Nour Mohsen
Sabir Ahamed
Sam DeLong
Samuel Rodriguez
Scottie Norton
2022 Cohort
LIST OF PARTICIPATING STUDENTS FROM CUNY LAGUARDIA COMMUNITY COLLEGE
SSA 101 Cultural Anthropology (2 classes), Professor Filip Stabrowski, Fall 2021
Arhum Aamir
Melida Alvarado
Elvis Bardoshi
Roxana Dueno
Destiny Janosik
Megin Massimo
Eugene Mohammedhoesein
Nicole Puza
Daisy Sabino
Tamia Wheeler
Maria Fonseca
Nathaniel Jay
Avleen Kaur
Salma Khoufaify
Xiaoen Liang
Davin Lopez-Vargas
Gisela Rijo
Dwight Williams
HUN 192 Urban Study: Art and Society, Professor Liena Vayzman, Spring 2022
Jonathan Brehm
Jasia Meher Chowdhury
Ali Cruz
Alan Flores
Darla Gamboa
Claudia Gonzalez
Maya Mitchell
Ashley Nunez
Xavier Checo
Sieara Williams
FROM INTERIM PRESIDENT PAUL ARCARIO
Connecting Threads is a wonderful example of the power of collaboration—among students and faculty, as well as between LaGuardia Community College and Bard Graduate Center—to create something truly new and exciting. With guidance and support from faculty and staff at both LaGuardia and BGC, our students have opened their closets, giving us a glimpse of not just their wardrobes, but of the experiences, relationships, hopes, and dreams that connect them to their clothing as well. The result is nothing less than a sartorial celebration of the rich diversity of our LaGuardia community!
Dr. Paul Arcario
Interim President
LaGuardia Community College
The City University of New York
FROM DEAN PETER N. MILLER
Bard Graduate Center is honored to partner with LaGuardia Community College on this exciting initiative. At BGC, our commitment is to expanding our understanding of the human experience by bridging the realms of things and the people who made them. Whether the objects are of the highest aesthetic intentionality or shaped more by function than anything else, they are precious relics of how humans have lived their lives. I am delighted to learn from the LaGuardia students’ research and interpretation.
Dr. Peter N. Miller
Dean
Bard Graduate Center
ABOUT LAGUARDIA COMMUNITY COLLEGE
LaGuardia Community College, located in Long Island City, Queens, our nation’s fastest-growing neighborhood, educates and supports more than 36,000 New Yorkers annually. We are committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion, and offer a welcoming environment for immigrants of all nations and individuals of all backgrounds.
As a nationally recognized expert at pioneering innovative programs and initiatives that are quickly adopted by four-year institutions and small businesses alike, we are changing the thinking about two-year colleges, their place in higher education and their role in strengthening our nation’s economy.
Since opening our doors to all in 1971, our successes reflect the hard work and dedication of our faculty and staff – so that students can write their own futures, immigrants can achieve their dreams, and small businesses learn how to grow and thrive.
ABOUT BARD GRADUATE CENTER
Bard Graduate Center is devoted to the study of decorative arts, design history, and material culture through research, advanced degrees, exhibitions, publications, and events.
At Bard Graduate Center, we study the human past through its material traces. We study objects—from those created for obvious aesthetic value to the ordinary things that are part of everyday life. Learning is what Bard Graduate Center is all about. Our accomplished faculty inspire students to strive for excellence, knowing that this will prepare them for the intellectual and professional rigors of careers in academia, in museums, and in the private sector. This high standard is equally the hallmark of the Gallery’s acclaimed exhibitions and related public programs.
The Center’s campus comprises a state-of-the-art academic programs building at 38 West 86th Street, the Gallery at 18 West 86th Street, and a residence hall at 410 West 58th Street. Founded by Dr. Susan Weber in 1993, Bard Graduate Center is an academic unit of Bard College through which it is accredited and a member of the Association of Research Institutes in Art History (ARIAH).
Credits & Special Thanks
A project like this requires the support and collaboration of many people. As Faculty Mentors for Connecting Threads since 2019, we give our sincere thanks to Professor Filip Stabrowski and Professor Liena Vayzman.
LaGuardia Community College leadership and faculty
Mr. Kenneth Adams, President
Dr. Paul Arcario, Provost
Dr. Bojana Blagojevic, Chairperson, Social Science Department
Dr. Payal Doctor, Chairperson, Humanities Department
Maureen Drennan, Associate Professor, Commercial Photography Program, Humanities Department
Dahlia Elsayed, Associate Professor, Fine Arts, Humanities Department
Lidiya Kan, HEA and Adjunct Lecturer, Commercial Photography Program, Humanities Department
Dr. Karlyn Koh, Director, LaGuardia Community College Honors Program (2020)
Dr. Gail Mellow, President (2000–2019)
Dr. Noam Scheindlin and Dr. Ana Fuentes, Directors, LaGuardia Community College Honors Program
Dr. Nireata Seals, Interim Provost and Senior Vice President (2020)
Arthur Simms, Professor, Fine Arts Program Coordinator, Humanities Department
LaGuardia and Wagner Archives staff at LaGuardia Community College
Soraya Ciego-Lemur, Deputy Director
Douglas Di Carlo, Archivist
Amanda Garfunkel, Archivist (2020)
Debra Grech, Archivist (2020)
Oleg Kleban, Information Systems Associate
Dr. Richard Lieberman, Director
David Mezick, Archivist
Dr. Stephen Petrus, Historian
Dr. Molly Rosner, Assistant Director of Education Programs
City University of New York, Transformative Learning in the Humanities Initiative, supported by the Mellon Foundation
Dr. Christina Katapodis, Executive Director, Transformative Learning in the Humanities
Khanh Le, Assistant Director, Transformative Learning in the Humanities
Bard Graduate Center faculty and staff
Dr. Susan Weber, Founder and Director
Dr. Peter N. Miller, Dean
Emma Cormack, Associate Curator
Eric Edler, Registrar
Amy Estes, Director of Marketing and Communications
Tim Ettenheim, Chief Operating Officer
Dr. Ivan Gaskill, Professor
Laura Grey, Art Director
Andrew Kircher, Director of Public Humanities and Research
Benjamin Krevolin, Chief Advancement Officer
Marianne Lamonaca, Chief Curator (2020)
Jocelyn Lau, Designer
Dr. Jesse Merandy, Director of the Digital Humanities and Digital Exhibitions
Emily Reilly, Director of Public Engagement
Carla Repice, Senior Manager of Education, Engagement, and Interpretation
Nadia Rivers, Coordinator of Public Programs, Education, and Engagement
Hellyn Teng, Web Manager
Maggie Walter, Coordinator of Marketing, Communications, and Design
Madison Jane Williams, Marketing Associate (2020)
Dr. Catherine Whalen, Professor
Bard Graduate Center’s partnership with LaGuardia Community College has been made possible through the generous support of Bard Graduate Center’s Board of Trustees and other donors to the institution. To support future projects, please visit www.bgc.bard.edu/donate
Bard Graduate Center is very grateful to Lisa Selz for her leadership on this valuable partnership with LaGuardia Community College and to both Lisa and Bernard Selz for their ongoing, generous support of our students.
Connecting Threads: Fashioning Identity in a Global World
Like all material culture, items of clothing and fashion have “social lives”—biographies containing the unique stories that have produced these objects. Clothing and fashion connect people across space and time, physically and symbolically. The curatorial process that created this exhibition resulted from a collaboration between two courses at CUNY LaGuardia Community College and Bard Graduate Center over the course of the 2019–20 academic year.
In the fall of 2019, cultural anthropology students from LaGuardia selected and studied objects of clothing and fashion to which they felt in some way connected. The artifacts they chose span the globe from Bangladesh and Tibet to Colombia and the U.S. The students’ papers, included in this exhibition, attempted to go behind the label and beyond the fabric, exploring in greater depth the social relationships required to produce, consume, dispose of, and reuse these objects. After the clothing items were safely stored and photographed at the LaGuardia & Wagner Archives, a new group of students in a spring semester art and society class guided the presentation of these objects to the public by writing the object descriptions and participating in the design of the exhibition.
The objects on display in Connecting Threads: Fashioning Identity in a Global World are thus also—and at the same time—manifestations of social connections of a different sort.
Selected and studied by one group of LaGuardia students last fall, they have subsequently been curated and exhibited by another group this spring. Drawing inspiration from the research papers, personal letters, and photographs of the objects’ owners, LaGuardia students offer their own interpretations (and representations) of these powerful objects. The result of this collaboration is Connecting Threads. The two groups of students have never met in person, yet they are also connected through the exhibition objects.
Originally conceived as a physical exhibition at Bard Graduate Center Gallery to be designed and installed by LaGuardia students, this exhibition has instead come to life in this online version during an extraordinary time of the COVID-19 pandemic. After the move to distance learning for both CUNY and Bard Graduate Center in March 2020, leaders of the project from both institutions made the decision to continue with the exhibition online. Thanks to the many LaGuardia and BGC staff and students who persisted to make Connecting Threads possible.
Connecting Threads invites you, the viewer, to enter into the social lives of these objects, to write yourselves into their biographies. Though we are unable to form and build upon these relationships in person, still we are able to connect. The exhibition may be virtual (and our connecting threads may be fiber-optic), but the connections remain very real.
Dr. Filip Stabrowski, Associate Professor, Anthropology, Social Science Department, LaGuardia Community College, The City University of New York
Dr. Liena Vayzman, Assistant Professor, Fine Arts, Humanities Department, LaGuardia Community College, The City University of New York
Faculty Mentors, Connecting Threads: Fashioning Identity in a Global World
LIST OF PARTICIPATING STUDENTS FROM CUNY LAGUARDIA COMMUNITY COLLEGE
SSA 101 Honors Cultural Anthropology, Professor Filip Stabrowski, Fall 2019
Sumi Aktar
Sam Brown
Natalia Cortes
Maria Doria
Angelise Freeman
Hanan Hassani
Jean-Pierre Hernandez
Edward Molina
Tenzin Pelchok
Monano Pierre-Paul
Sarina Ranjit
Steven Saputra
Dolma Sherpa
Kiersten Walker
Owen White
HUN 192 Urban Study: Art and Society, Professor Liena Vayzman, Spring 2020
Prestasia Aldridge
Anju Allo
Rajan Chaudhary
Andre Dunkley
Josephine Elumeze
Stephanie Flores
Juancamilo Florez
Cristal Grey
Jeancarlo Gutierrez
Nusrat Jahan
Amal Khalil
Hunain Khan
Sony Khanal
Jose Luis Lobo Lara
Sharmin Momtaj
Kerwin Phillips
Sonia Sultana
Aung Myo Thet
Jessica Toomey
Magaly Villano
Flora White
Jason Wright
Website Development by Hellyn Teng and Jesse Merandy
Design by Jocelyn Lau
Photography by Paul Lewis Anderson
Project Management by Emily Reilly
Digital Asset Management by Juliana Fagua Arias
Copy Editing by Rachael Schwabe
FROM INTERIM PRESIDENT PAUL ARCARIO
Connecting Threads is a wonderful example of the power of collaboration—among students and faculty, as well as between LaGuardia Community College and Bard Graduate Center—to create something truly new and exciting. With guidance and support from faculty and staff at both LaGuardia and BGC, our students have opened their closets, giving us a glimpse of not just their wardrobes, but of the experiences, relationships, hopes, and dreams that connect them to their clothing as well. The result is nothing less than a sartorial celebration of the rich diversity of our LaGuardia community!
Dr. Paul Arcario
Interim President
LaGuardia Community College
The City University of New York
FROM DEAN PETER N. MILLER
Bard Graduate Center is honored to partner with LaGuardia Community College on this exciting initiative. At BGC, our commitment is to expanding our understanding of the human experience by bridging the realms of things and the people who made them. Whether the objects are of the highest aesthetic intentionality or shaped more by function than anything else, they are precious relics of how humans have lived their lives. This knowledge and the exploration it requires can enrich our existence and that of students at any level—this explains why we started working with New York City public high school students four years ago and why we launched this initiative with LaGuardia Community College this year. I am delighted to learn from the LaGuardia students’ research and interpretation, and we look forward to building on this partnership in the years to come.
Dr. Peter N. Miller
Dean
Bard Graduate Center
ABOUT LAGUARDIA COMMUNITY COLLEGE
LaGuardia Community College, located in Long Island City, Queens, our nation’s fastest-growing neighborhood, educates and supports more than 36,000 New Yorkers annually. We are committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion, and offer a welcoming environment for immigrants of all nations and individuals of all backgrounds.
As a nationally recognized expert at pioneering innovative programs and initiatives that are quickly adopted by four-year institutions and small businesses alike, we are changing the thinking about two-year colleges, their place in higher education and their role in strengthening our nation’s economy.
Since opening our doors to all in 1971, our successes reflect the hard work and dedication of our faculty and staff – so that students can write their own futures, immigrants can achieve their dreams, and small businesses learn how to grow and thrive.
ABOUT BARD GRADUATE CENTER
Bard Graduate Center is devoted to the study of decorative arts, design history, and material culture through research, advanced degrees, exhibitions, publications, and events.
At Bard Graduate Center, we study the human past through its material traces. We study objects—from those created for obvious aesthetic value to the ordinary things that are part of everyday life. Learning is what Bard Graduate Center is all about. Our accomplished faculty inspire students to strive for excellence, knowing that this will prepare them for the intellectual and professional rigors of careers in academia, in museums, and in the private sector. This high standard is equally the hallmark of the Gallery’s acclaimed exhibitions and related public programs.
The Center’s campus comprises a state-of-the-art academic programs building at 38 West 86th Street, the Gallery at 18 West 86th Street, and a residence hall at 410 West 58th Street. Founded by Dr. Susan Weber in 1993, Bard Graduate Center is an academic unit of Bard College through which it is accredited and a member of the Association of Research Institutes in Art History (ARIAH).
Credits & Special Thanks
A project like this requires the support and collaboration of many people. As Faculty Mentors for Connecting Threads, we give our sincere thanks to Professor Filip Stabrowski and Professor Liena Vayzman.
Photography by Paul Lewis Anderson
LAGUARDIA COMMUNITY COLLEGE LEADERSHIP
Dr. Paul Arcario, Interim President
Dr. Gail Mellow, President (2000–2019)
Dr. Nireata Seals, Interim Provost and Senior Vice President
Dr. Bojana Blagojevic, Chairperson, Social Science Department
Dr. Payal Doctor, Chairperson, Humanities Department
Dr. Karlyn Koh, Director, LaGuardia Community College Honors Program
LAGUARDIA AND WAGNER ARCHIVES STAFF AT LAGUARDIA COMMUNITY COLLEGE
Dr. Richard Lieberman, Director
Soraya Ciego-Lemur, Deputy Director
David Mezick, Debra Grech, Amanda Garfunkel, Douglas Di Carlo, Archivists
BARD GRADUATE CENTER FACULTY AND STAFF
Dr. Susan Weber, Founder and Director
Dr. Peter N. Miller, Dean
Dr. Ivan Gaskill, Professor
Dr. Catherine Whalen, Professor
Eric Edler, Registrar
Amy Estes, Director of Marketing and Communications
Tim Ettenheim, Chief Operating Officer
Laura Grey, Art Director
Benjamin Krevolin, Chief Advancement Officer
Marianne Lamonaca, Chief Curator
Jocelyn Lau, Designer
Dr. Jesse Merandy, Director of the Digital Media Lab
Emily Reilly, Director of Public Engagement/Associate Gallery Director
Carla Repice, Senior Manager of Education, Engagement, and Interpretation
Nadia Rivers, Coordinator of Public Programs, Education, and Engagement
Hellyn Teng, Web Manager
Maggie Walter, Coordinator of Marketing, Communications, and Design
Madison Jane Williams, Marketing Associate
Bard Graduate Center’s partnership with LaGuardia Community College has been made possible through the generous support of Bard Graduate Center’s Board of Trustees and other donors to the institution. To support future projects, please visit www.bgc.bard.edu/donate.
Bard Graduate Center is very grateful to Lisa Selz for her leadership on this valuable partnership with LaGuardia Community College and to both Lisa and Bernard Selz for their ongoing, generous support of our students.