Bodegas across Ridgewood and Bushwick will celebrate Advent as a “living calendar” featuring the work of 24 local artists throughout December.
The project started on Dec. 1, and residents are able to the Advent calendar at Kanowa Food at 1711 Bleecker St. in Ridgewood to see where each art installation can be viewed on which day.
The Advent calendar comes with stickers to place over each bodega on every day of Advent.
Seth Ruggles Hiler, an artist in residence with Brooklyn Abbey, will be one of the artists displaying his portrait paintings.
“It is essential for an artist to enter community. Working with Bushwick Abbey and Iglesia de la Santa Cruz, Brooklyn artists have the opportunity to do so at the most local of levels,” Hiler said. “Sharing work publicly in these neighborhood hubs is an exciting way of creating connections, which is the magic that is art.”
Reverend Nell Archer, vicar of Bushwick Abbey and Iglesia de la Santa Cruz, said the event aims to take consumerism out of the equation for inspiring the imagination of the community.
“In the face of incessant pressure from advertisers to consume beyond our means, the season of Advent presents an opportunity to resist consumer culture and to reflect on the systems that distort our relationships with one another and the earth,” Archer said. “The Bodega Advent Project encourages the community to use Advent as a time to engage our imaginations in the work of creating a better world where all are welcome and all can flourish.”
The public can also follow along on Twitter and Instagram @BodegaAdvent.
