SaveArtSpace has partnered with Michele Pred to bring more public art to Milwaukee, WI during the Republican National Convention, starting June 27, 2024.

Curated by Michele Pred, this billboard art exhibition featuring five billboards in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, coinciding with the Republican National Convention, which is scheduled for July 15th to 18th. The billboards will be installed prior to the convention on June 27th and remain until July 21st, a few days after its close.

The Vote for Democracy selected artists are Airco Caravan, Cat Del Buono, Yolanda Hoskey, and Lena Wolff & Hope Meng.

Autocracy and the reactionary, racist ideas that go with it are on the march in the US and across the globe. They are given voice almost daily by the leader of the Republican Party and his minions, even as the majority of Americans oppose their policies. To stop this surge of fear and hate, we must make sure that our system does not devolve further. Only then can we continue the fight for an expanded democracy. Inviting persuadable voters to this conversation on one of the largest media stages of the year is a huge opportunity to do just that.

Starting June 27, 2024, SaveArtSpace will launch public art installations for each selected work on billboard ad spaces in Milwaukee, WI.

Press

Selected Artists

Location: E Oklahoma Ave & S Brust Ave, Milwaukee, WI

Airco Caravan (b. the Netherlands) earned a BA at HKU, Academy of Arts Utrecht, the Netherlands. After a career in advertising and graphic design, Caravan returned to fine art, studied silk screening in Amsterdam, and oil painting at The Art Students League of New York. 

Caravan has participated in exhibitions worldwide, like Museum de Fundatie, MOTI Museum, Amsterdam Museum, MOYA Vienna, Arte Museum Korea, and Museum of Memory and Tolerance, Mexico City. Solo shows in Amsterdam and New York. Attention-grabbing guerrilla art in the public domain, including an illegal 4-foot-tall bronze statue of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. - still standing! (read more on www.mlk50.nl) 

Caravan was the founder and curator of two Nasty Women Amsterdam fundraiser exhibitions and curator of several group shows in Amsterdam. 

Artist Statement:

PEST AC. FOR A BETTER WORLD.

My move from Amsterdam to New York in 2022 wasn’t just fun. The first thing I had to buy was a spray can of Raid, to get rid of the roaches. Unpleasant, but very effective.

It brought me to the idea of a new body of work. As an activist and feminist conceptual artist, I create art contributing to a better world. And wouldn’t it be nice if we could spray away all nasty things in our society? Just like killing bugs? So I created a growing series of almost 200 different spray cans and spray bottles for a better world: Airco Caravan's Pest Control. Bold, humorous, and colorful. Including spray cans like Dump Trump, Bans Off Our Bodies, Abortion 4 All, Put'n End To It, Free Palestine, and Zap A Racist.

They are executed in various mediums: wheatpaste posters, stickers, laser-cut plexiglass with gemstones, labeled spray cans, solid cast resin spray bottles, wall tapestries, and... a billboard!

These series build upon previous social justice series. Like oil paintings on cut-out panels questioning whitening products. And the anti-racism series that I made with band-aids in skin tones from beige to brown and black - which were hard to find before the BLM protests in 2020. In 2014 I protested against the pro-life movement by using their scary silicon fetuses for the opposite message: pro-abortion. And I will continue creating disruptive and unexpected art to fight inequality and to make people think. Because I believe that art can make a difference. As an alien, I'm not allowed to vote but this billboard is the least I can do. Want Equality? VOTE! 

Connect with Airco on Instagram at @airco_caravan.

Location: W State St & N 50th Pl, Milwaukee, WI

Cat Del Buono a daughter of immigrants. She received a BA from Boston College, an MFA from School of Visual Arts (SVA), and is currently getting a PhD in Naples, Italy. With more than 10 years experience as an artist, Del Buono uses video, installation, and performance to focus on social justice, gender equality, and her community.

Her recent Fulbright Scholar Award allowed her to create a video installation highlighting domestic violence in Italy which went on to win the Fulbright 75th Anniversary Award. This work then led to a scholarship for the Mind, Gender, and Language PhD program at University of Naples Federico II where she will create a video series for kids that focuses on the prevention of domestic violence.

Other grants and awards include the Visiting Artist at the American Academy in Rome, Brooklyn Arts Fund, Bronx Museum AIM Fellowship, NYC Mayor’s Office 2020 Advocate Award, School of Visual Arts Alumni Award, and a NYFA Stipend. She has exhibited across the US and overseas, including Microscope Gallery, Bronx Museum, Vetlanda Museum Sweden, Blue Sky Gallery, and MoCA Miami. Her work has been featured in Miami Herald, Brooklyn Rail, La Repubblica, Art Newspaper, Art Spiel, Jezebel, Huffington Post, and on PBS. In addition, Del Buono founded and runs a non-profit organization called Our House Meriden that offers free after-school art classes for underprivileged kids. She continues to speak on panels about gender inequality and how art can be a catalyst for change.

Connect with Cat on Instagram at @catdelbuonoartist & @catdelbuono.

Location: N Green Bay Ave & W Messmer St, Milwaukee, WI

Yolanda Hoskey is a visual storyteller whose work transcends time, capturing the essence of human experience through photography. With a background in Theatre Arts and Film, she brings a unique perspective to her craft, weaving narratives that challenge and inspire. Despite starting her photo journey in 2020, Yolanda has garnered recognition from esteemed publications like Essence Magazine and her work has appeared in The New York Times, Bloomberg, and Aperture Magazine. Selected as one of fifty global cohorts in Getty Images' Creator Accelerator Program in 2023 and later becoming a Magnum Foundation fellow in 2024, Yolanda's talent has been acknowledged on an international scale. Collaborating with companies such as Fujifilm, Meta, and Walmart, she combines artistic vision with a commitment to representation, aiming to amplify underrepresented voices and reshape narratives. Through her lens, Yolanda continues to push boundaries and spark meaningful dialogue in the world of visual storytelling.

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Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, Yolanda Hoskey (b. 1992), is a multi-disciplinary artist based in New York.

Her work is driven by the notion that blackness is non-monolithic. Growing up, Yolanda would see the same archetypes of blackness portrayed in the media, contrary to the examples around her in her day-to-day life. She imagines a world where blackness is documented as multi-dimensional. In her images, she feels it necessary to visualize black people as dynamic, soft, free, and unapologetic, using a mixture of portraiture, documentary, and fashion photography as tools to reflect these ideas. As an image maker, Yolanda aims to create a truer, more nuanced catalog of the black identity. 

Connect with Yolanda on Instagram at @ghettoyolie.

Location: W Oklahoma Ave & S 3rd St, Milwaukee, WI

Lena Wolff an artist, craftswoman, and activist for civic engagement who has been based in the San Francisco Bay Area since the early 1990's. Her work extends out of American folk-art traditions while at the same time being rooted in minimalism, geometric abstraction, Op art, social practice, feminist and political art. Lena's broad interconnected artistic output includes drawing, collage, sculpture, text-based works, frequent collaboration, and public projects. In 2017, she formed Art for Democracy, beginning with an anti-hate poster in the Bay Area, followed by the widespread national public art campaign to boost voter participation. Over the last two decades, her work has been presented in galleries and museums across the country and collected by ONE National Lesbian and Gay Archives, Berkeley Art Museum, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Oakland Museum of California, San Francisco Arts Commission, Alameda County Arts Commission, Cleveland Clinic, University of Iowa Museum, and the Zuckerman Museum of Art, among others. She lives with her wife, artist, teacher, and illustrator, Miriam Klein Stahl and their daughter in Berkeley, California.

Connect with Lena on Instagram at @lenawolffstudio.

Hope Meng is a visual artist whose work exists at the unlikely junction of typography and textiles. Hope creates sewn fabric compositions using a typographic system that she developed, based on the visual language of American quilt patterns. Hope has exhibited at several galleries and museum shows, including Hella Feminist at Oakland Museum of California, the Berkeley Art Museum, and Scalehouse Gallery in Bend, OR. Her work is in the collections of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Oakland Museum of California. She lives and works in San Francisco, CA.

Connect with Hope on Instagram at @hopemengdesign.

Curator

Location: W Bluemound Rd & N Hawley Rd, Milwaukee, WI

Michele Pred is a Swedish-American conceptual artist whose practice includes sculpture, assemblage, and performance. Her work uncovers the cultural and political meaning behind everyday objects, with a concentration on feminist themes such as equal pay and reproductive rights. Pred has been represented by the Nancy Hoffman Gallery in New York since 2004. She has organized Feminist Art Parades in numerous cities, including Chicago, New York, Miami, Washington DC, San Francisco, and Stockholm. Pred has exhibited both nationally and internationally at the V&A Museum in London, The Berkeley Art Museum (BAMPFA) in Berkeley, CA; Neuberger Museum, White Plains, NY; Bild Museet and Kulturhuset in Sweden; University of Westminster, London; and at the University of Technology, Sydney, Australia. 

In 2022, she curated a nationwide billboard exhibition titled Vote for Abortion Rights, which featured ten artists.

Connect with Michele on Instagram at @michelepred.

Participating Organizations

Founded in 2015, SaveArtSpace is a non-profit organization that works to create an urban gallery experience, launching exhibitions that address intersectional themes and foster a progressive message of social change. By placing culture over commercialism, SaveArtSpace aims to empower artists from all walks of life and inspire a new generation of young creatives and activists.