New Craft Artists in Action // NCAA NET WORKS

WHAT IS THE NCAA? The New Craft Artists in Action are an international artist collective with open membership andhome-court representation in Boston, MA. Through exhibitions, workshops, community projects, and publication they work to integrate the skills, materials, and histories of many intersecting disciplines: athletics, craft, public space aesthetics, labor, recreation, and feminism. NCAA projects combine the discipline, sportsmxnship and physicality of athletics with the focus, dexterity and creativity of craft. This unlikely marriage is meant to encourage participation over spectatorship, and to reassess the traditional cultural and socio-economic contexts in which these activities evolved. Building upon DIY skill-sharing models, the collective creates dynamic learning environments and bodies of work that may call upon knitting, crochet, bookbinding, screen printing, building, action photography, ball handling, etc. The NCAA believes these programs should be both critical and fun, inciting the tactile and tactical liberation of recreation.  NET WORKS // LEARN TO CRAFT HAND-MADE NETS FOR EMPTY HOOPS IN YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD  Their most notable project Net Works - by which vibrant hand-made basketball nets are crafted for empty basketball hoops - employs creative problem solving to call attention to neglected public spaces. They also encourage positive relationships between athletes, artists and neighbors. Learn more about Net Works below and peruse this blog for documentation on Net Works and our many other projects! Brought to participants via traveling workshops, pick up games and internet cataloguing, the NCAA is a craftivist project that addresses public space, diversity, collaboration, feminism, and interdisciplinary learning. The collective assembles hand-made basketball nets for abandoned hoops, usually via knit and crochet, to build proactive inclusive relationships between artists, athletes, and neighbors. Here the form and function of the “street” and the “domestic” collide in hand-made tactical aesthetics that express dissidence and generate new approaches to public space. Basketball has slowly evolved since 1891, when James Naismith posed a recycled peach basket as the first hoop for his students in Springfield, MA. Woven nets emerged several years later, introducing a new dimension for movement and audio-kinetic satisfaction. Inspired by the many ways nets benefit the game, NCAA Net Works proceeds by a mapping process and a form of DIY slow production that utilize creative problem solving in under-maintained urban spaces. The project draws attention to the expressive potential of these spaces while challenging commercially driven professional athletic institutions. We encourage you to initiate Net Works in your city or participate by uploading images of lacking courts that you see around town. Click the map below to contribute! Tweet @YarnOverTime Like us on FACEBOOK! Check out FLICKR

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Very excited to announce that we’ve switched over from this blog format to an official NCAA website that is a bit easier to navigate. We will keep this trusty tumblr as an archive of stories and events from over the years. Most of the content is duplicated on our new website, though. Please check it out!

NEW CRAFT ARTISTS IN ACTION / NCAA NET WORKS OFFICIAL WEBSITE

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NCAA + QSS in SPLIT, CROATIA

In August 2017, The NCAA was invited to Split, Croatia to work with kindred spirits, an activist/art collective called Queer Sport Split. NCAA Team Captain Maria Molteni and Boston artist Melanie Bernier spent 2 weeks on the Adriatic coast exploring spaces throughout Split and several Dalmatian Islands. Together with their QSS host artist Tonci Batalic they offered several community craft circles at a local bar and youth advocacy nonprofit where artists and organizers often meet. QSS + NCAA utilized local grant support to create art and craft based interventions in underutilized recreational spaces, a ubiquitous phenomenon that speaks to a complex social and political history of the city.

Split is an ancient city whose distinct culture draws from a beautiful coastal landscape and turbulent political history. Today, local life rapidly changes as Croatia manages the transition from socialism into a market-based economy, and an explosion of tourism redirects resources into private development. Meanwhile, the international refugee crises continues to produce Syrian transplants for relocation in the city. As new ideas and cultures populate the area, the politically marginalized LGBTQ community has begun to assert their place as equals in Croatian society. QSS draws attention to issues of LGBTQ rights. They also advocate for community access to, and care of, public commons, which are being increasingly privatized for tourism and development. They share a “Soft Power” approach to activism with the NCAA. In most cases craft-based knit or crochet intervention is a tactic. The collaboration was quite natural since both create public work with intersectional implications for community, recreation, reclamation, and inclusion.

Prior to our arrival, Tonci had documented a dynamic site for our intervention, what appeared to be an overgrown slab of concrete installed between two towering housing projects in the neighborhood Trstenik. Intersecting patches of tall grass, the surface was painted with broad red lines, resembling athletic court markings. From a bird’s eye view the lines actually spell “R4”. The same city zoning labels claim backboards of two rimless would-be hoops. Bookending the court were net-less football goals and wildflowers that stood like a sea of spectators. Several patches of black graffiti sprayed on the concrete by locals made bold statements. Their English translations assert: City Planning is not a rape tool, Stupid Urban Plan (GUP GLUP), Traffic Jam, and We want playgrounds, not parking lots. Tonci explained that this court, once a recreational space built under the Soviet-era Split 3 urban plan, is now the site of lively protests. Like many recreational spaces it is vaguely declared “80% private/ 20% public” so that the occasional pet relieving itself is the only day-to-day activity it sees. We asked neighbors and pedestrians who confirmed that it was seen as a no man’s land. We sought to draw attention to this neglected area and reassert its potential as a public common.

1 2 3 SPLIT! COMMUNISM RISES AND FALLS 

The cascading geometric buildings of Split 3, now a larger section of the city in which Trstenik is situated, were built in the late 1960's as part of an urban plan by Slovenian architects Marjan Bezan, Nives Starc and Vladimir Music (Music had studied at Harvard). The plan sought to humanize what many see as unsuccessful brutalist modern housing project models (local iterations are known as Split 2). The new plans would create engaging, communal neighborhoods for an initial 50,000 residents who relocated from smaller villages in the region. Inspired by pedestrian-centered streets and squares of old Roman design, this “city within a city” would decentralize the downtown (centered around the 4th Century Medieval Diocletian’s Palace, aka Split 1) but run accessibly parallel to its 2 main commercial pedestrian streets.

In an article written for the Guardian, Back to the Future: The Curious Case of Split 3 Public Space, Diana Magdic describes a harmonious image of Split 3 that even won the heart of modernism’s harshest critic, Jane Jacobs.

“The urban plan and buildings themselves were kind of manuals for good contemporary living… places where people meet, interact, engage in joint activities, to play, to learn. And it was successful, proved by longitudinal surveys of their satisfaction with living conditions through the last 5 decades. Citizens of Split 3 are still able to walk to the sea or to the school or to the store without having to stop at any traffic lights; they have playgrounds and sports fields and green areas just outside their homes; they even have a great architecture that accompanies that brilliant urban plan…”

Strolling through Split 3 this summer, the neighborhood still feels active and vibrant, even if some commercial spaces stand empty. This was the only area where we saw people using a basketball court - a group of young women at that! But Split 3 plans were not meant to be isolated, rather replicated throughout the city. In the 1980s many areas of its development were halted. After Tito’s death, Yugoslavia began to deteriorate, the beginning of the end of communism, finally terminated by wars of the 1990s. Today, half-finished concrete buildings crowned with rotting metal support beams litter the bluffs of Trstenik. Playgrounds overgrown with fennel, mint, and grass squat throughout Split 3 and the entire city. Most recreational spaces are under-maintained, half finished or completely abandoned. Remnants of equipment and scattered building material do however present an appealing and colorful culture of design, an 80s pop brand of coastal ruin porn. This is the rich backdrop of our abandoned Trstenik court.

“THE BEST OF OUR PEOPLE”

The dusty spectacle of cotton candy urban casualties creates a distinct aesthetic motif, the appeal is almost like a Mediterranean Miami. Even the forgotten, frozen playgrounds seem more vibrant than modern US complexes. To an outsider it feels surreal, more enticing than depressing. As for the presence of public art, all spaces are largely dominated by clubs of football superfans called Torcida who depict, through ambitious and well executed mural works, the object of their obsession- Hajduk.

When we first arrived in Split, we saw the Hajduk crest EVERYWHERE- on cars, garage doors, stories of building facades, store windows- a checkered grid of red and white squares, as is found in the Croatian flag, encircled by a blue ring that supports white lettering- “Hajduk, Split” often accompanied by the dates 1911 or 1955. Looking a bit like an automobile logo, we assumed it was a commercial ad campaign, but Tonci and our new friends in Split explained that it represented Split’s local football team. While the notion of extreme sports fandom is not at all foreign to visitors from Boston, we agreed that this blew even Red Sox hysteria out of the water. One might only compare the support of Hajduk to fans of the Celtics, Bruins, Sox and Patriots combined. Of course we wondered about the history of the movement and the socio-political implications of Torcida’s solidarity. Here is brief summary of our findings…

Hajduk is a professional Croatian football club founded in 1911. As the story goes Croatian students who were studying in Prague gathered in a centuries old bar founded during Austro-Hungarian rule. The young students had just come from a professional football match and decided that their city, Split, should have its own team. They officially registered a new football club, soliciting advice from their professor, Josip Barač for a name. Barač suggested “Hajduk” as the best representation of Croatian people. Slavic history tells us that Hajduk were 17th-19th century bandits- guerrilla fighters and highwaymen who resisted the Ottoman Empire. Like Robin Hood, they were known to steal from the rich and protect the poor in the name of ”humanity, friendship, freedom, bravery, protection of the weak, and defiance of power”.

The team enjoyed success leading up to the World Wars and into the post-war Yugoslav league system, their “golden era” being in the 1970s. In 1950 they organized the fan base inspired by Brazilian fans, “Torcida” who attended the 1950 World Cup. Today Hajduk is majority owned by the City of Split with around 40,000 owning club members. The queer artist and activist friends we met during our residency explained that the strength of Torcida has surpassed the strength of the city in most circumstances. Some murals depart from the basic crest or lettering and depict elaborate narrative scenes in which tough members of Torcida face off with the local police force. Citizens of Split seem only to effectively organize when the matter relates to Hajduk. This combined with the increased nationalistic, racist and intolerant attitude of many of the fans (some have begun to demonstrate the nazi solute) is something that Queer Sport is frustrated but also motivated by- a cultural polarization, sometimes branded “culture war” that is all too familiar to resistance groups and art collectives like the NCAA in a gentrifying, militarizing, alt-right-normalizing United States.

SOFT HAJDUK- IF YOU BUILD IT

NCAA and QSS put our heads together, improvising to address this interesting context found in both of our countries and to reassert the positive, inclusive potential of public commons and sport in Split. QSS’s Tonci and Tomislav bolted fresh new rims on the naked backboards of our Trstenik court so that we could install the Net Works created during open community workshops. We crafted the nets using fishing rope, calling to mind Croatia's seafaring history. It turned out to be a durable, colorful and accessible material. Small businesses and specialty stores are dwindling in the city, as it’s overtaken by cheap souvenir shops and trinket kiosks, but fishing and diving stores are holding strong since these activities are supported by tourism. 

The diving ropes were also excellent for the first ever football/soccer net we would create! Piecing together granny squares in an array of coastal color schemes, Maria and Melanie recreated their take on the Hajduk crest, at once queering the design while engaging with their fans. Harkening back to the original ideals of Hajduk, we encourage the Soft Power that stands for a more just and kind movement. We referred to our new crest as “Soft Hajduk”, attaching it to the center of a functional macrame football net that was crafted on site.  Unsure how our work might be received by neighbors, we’d hardly tied the last knot before 3 boys, carrying a colorful soccer ball, scampered out onto the court for a round of penalty kicks. They walked straight up to the net and started caressing and petting it- Tonci told us they kept saying how beautiful it was. One saw the checkered shadow cast on the pavement and shouted excitedly “Hajduk!” We had the honor of watching them repeated kick the ball, like a rocket, into the strong, sturdy net.

THE KIDS ARE PLAYING BASKETBALL!

Our work in Split concluded with a QSS-sponsored "Right to the Beach" party, where Melanie led a seaside Punk Rock Aerobics workout. During our residency we learned how sports, activism, and craft empower QSS members to take an active role fighting for public space and LGBTQ rights in Split. We knew the nets would draw attention to the abandoned lot in the heart of Trstenik. Still, we were conscious that we were outsiders who could be seen as tampering with an important cultural icon. We had utmost respect for the deep heritage of Hajduk, hoping to find a way to meet in the middle while advocating in solidarity with like-minded host artists. As with many other NCAA projects, we looked to the roots of our subject as a way to innovate and expand its future impact. The great news is the project was an overall hit! It was featured in several local papers and even a TV Broadcast. 

We left Croatia in August and were delighted to receive an e-mail from Tonci in November- subject line: “great news- kids are playing basketball!” He continued…

I have met an artist living at Trstenik and he told me kids have cleaned the area around one of the nets and they play basketball there regularly! Amazing, isn't it!

As soon as I return form Belgium I will go there and take some photos!

Hugs,

Tonči

We couldn’t be more thankful for our time and community in Croatia. We’re proud of the work we were able to do together!

ABOUT QSS:

Since 2011, Queer Sport Split has organized gatherings and interventions with "soft activism": activism that intervenes in the public space of the city through crocheting and knitting. The first such intervention was during the planning of Split Pride in 2012, where knit flags pointed to the right of all citizens to public space, rights which the LGBTIQ population was denied by the local government. In 2014, Queer Sport Split held the Marathon On Needles, a public knit-in, to promote access to public space, guerrilla activism, and social participation.

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New Craft Artists in Action are preeetty excited to unveil a new project that’s been long in the making. 

Hard in the Paint, Harambee Park is a public basketball court makeover in Boston's Dorchester neighborhood, the culmination of NCAA Team Captain Maria Molteni's Boston AIR residency through the City of Boston with the BCYF Perkins Community Center. 

For 11 months, Molteni worked with youth and teens from the neighborhood, hosting after school workshops on art, athletics, public space and social justice. 

The final 20,000 square foot basketball court mural, painted collaboratively over 2 weeks in June, exhibits shapes, colors and marks found in the students' own drawings of their dream basketball courts which were also displayed publicly during the painting process.

In response to the courts centerpiece "Boston's Got Wings" (originally painted by Redbull referencing their slogan “Redbull gives you wings”), neighbors were asked “What do YOU think Boston's Got?" Their answers served as a reclamation of this existing half-court feature. Such multilingual phrases were compiled in a community zine and referenced in the intricate court patterns.

Molteni organized and directed two weeks of structured and improvisational painting completed by a team of adult artist colleagues, hired teen girls from the Perkins center, and daily drop-in participants from the community. Chalkboards attached to the surrounding fence also invited passersby to sketch their ideas and submit “requests” for imagery to be painted in real time. The free-form painting language of the court activates the margins of the space and opens it to a wider array of neighbors. 

The court was completed on the 125th anniversary of the invention of basketball in Massachusetts and the 125th anniversary of the founding of Franklin Field, now Harambee Park. 

An excellent team of professional local artists and teachers aided Molteni in the final designs, painting and facilitation of open community paint days: Randi Shandroski, Kristine Roan, Kevin Clancy, Natanja Driscoll, Silvi Naci, Gustavo Barceloni, Ali Reid, Jena Tegeler, Xray Aims, Francisco Ormaza, Camila McCarthy. Special Thanks to Raymond Heath, Sa'mya Givan, Karin Goodfellow, Christian Guerra, Sharon Kavai, The Codman Square Neighborhood Council, Mr. Al, Troy Smith, Miss Michelle, Mister Sherman, Miss Kiya, Mister Kyrone, Miss Unique, Miss Charisse,  and all of our amazing students from Perkins.

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We can’t overlook the chilling news from Saudi Arabia of young Pro-democracy protestors being tortured and executed on their own soil, but it’s also worth recognizing the small beams of light that rise to the surface amidst such terror and injustice. There’s no doubt that as women are allowed to realize and exercise their hidden strength, they may also come up against further threat. We are humbled by the courage and persistence it takes women and girls in some parts of the world to access what we’ve become so used to. We’re in solidarity with these efforts and hope they will lead to positive change. 

Check out this article in the NYTimes: Saudi Arabia to Offer Physical Education Classes for Girls

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John Angelos on the Orioles and Racist Incident at Fenway by Edge of Sports with Dave Zirin

The Baltimore Orioles COO explains how sports can help fight racism, in our society, and why it's important to speak out against such hate.

Moving beyond ceremonial apologies and Boston’s lasting history of racism in athletics!

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Ok ok, so the Rio Olympics are totally over. We were too sun-struck to bust this post out in time, but wanted to share some of the documentation from last-summer’s rad NCAA project while people still had Olympics on the brain! ...

In the Summer of 2015, Montserrat College of Art's Galleries organized a series of four Pop-Up Exhibitions in Beverly, MA. These shows, featuring a new theme and a range of public programs each week, were guest-hosted by regional curators, artists and critics for the month of June. For week 4 curator Pam Campanaro, a kindred spirit by way of her experience with athletics and art, invited the New Craft Artists in Action to exhibit.

For their Pop-Up Field Days the NCAA transformed Montserrat Galleries into a vibrant Track-and-Field-inspired mixed-use space.

Often held in Spring at the end of the school year, the Field Day serves as a celebratory student utopia in an extracurricular, autonomous zone. Such light-hearted competitions, separate in nature from gym class requirements or exclusive school sport championship, provide opportunities for students to participate in competitive physical challenges in a more open and collaborative environment. The NCAA's project used the playful context of these grammar school festivities, such as the three-legged race or balloon toss, as a jumping off point for performing absurdist and cross-disciplinary games. Aesthetically, the installation draws from historical Olympics branding and design, to reference an alternate vision of a global utopian/dystopian model.

In the days leading up to the exhibition reception, visitors were invited to explore the recreational gallery space through free-form, self-governed engagement. NCAA artists Taylor McVay, Andrea Evans, and Maria Molteni were on site to install the space and develop a new publication. "Sports Illustrated" includes a how-to catalogue of Field Day Finale events, images and reference material that inspired the project, and an essay feature by curator Pam Campanaro. 

At the closing Field Day Finale, guests were encouraged to participate in a variety of lively craft and athletic-based challenges such as:

WOVEN LACE 3 LEGGED RACE!

A video posted by Maria Molteni (@strega_maria) on Jun 25, 2015 at 2:37pm PDT

TEAM KNITTING!

A video posted by Maria Molteni (@strega_maria) on Jun 25, 2015 at 3:55pm PDT

FIGURE 8 YARN RACE!

A video posted by Maria Molteni (@strega_maria) on Jun 25, 2015 at 2:13pm PDT

HAND CROCHET RELAY!

A video posted by Maria Molteni (@strega_maria) on Jun 25, 2015 at 2:53pm PDT

Field Day Olympians competed for a chance to win books, jerseys, prints, and other NCAA wares. Visitors and readers were asked to consider the implications of the 'Home Court Advantage' in the context of their own comfort zones and physical abilities. All ages and skill levels were welcome to join the fun. The "Sports Illustrated" zine aided in leveling the playing field and providing everyone with basic skills to compete.

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Great new press in Artslant Berlin! They included a nice chunk of info about the NCAA’s participation in Contesting/Contexting Sport: to reclaim the field with art and activism at NGBK in Berlin! 

One quote from an interview with New Craft Artists in Action team captain Maria Molteni : 

New Craft Artists in Action also addresses the gap between the purported goals of big sporting events and their execution. Installed in the nGbK courtyard, Anarchy Acronym asks visitors to rethink the names of often-corrupt sporting institutions, “occupying” their abbreviations. The works themselves mimic the advertising banners circling sporting arenas and visitors are asked to write new meanings for their acronyms in chalk. “We’d like to reveal what players and viewers actually value in athletics that isn't about capitalism, corruption and power,” says the artist, who founded the NCAA—the “New Craft Artists in Action” collective—in 2010.

Check out the article to hear more about our work in the show and an amazing group of international artists working with sport. 

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New Craft Artists in Action are pleased to be included among an amazing grouping of international artists for an exhibit opening in Berlin tomorrow!

Contesting/Contexting Sport 2016: Reclaim the Field with Art and Activism

(Queer and Feminist Sport Exhibition and Program)

July 9- August 28 @ nGbK Gallery + Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien

(Above photo: Site specific installation painted by Maria Molteni for CCsport at NGBK, Berlin)

About the Exhibition :

In the field of sport, discrimination is present as in hardly any other social sub-system. Gender-specific categories, that are often based on the principle of heteronormative exclusion, prevail. In the context of the upcoming mega-events –the 2016 Olympic Games and the (men’s) European Football Championship– critical voices from the field of sport will be linked with creative interventions at the nGbK. The exhibition combines artistic positions with activist strategies - creating counterproposals to the consumer-oriented and nationalistic/indentitarian competition energy. Accompanying events offer a platform for emergence of queer solidarities and alternative concepts going beyond sport.

Exhibiting Artists: Pascal Anson, Aquahomo, Imtiaz Ashraf, Berlin Bruisers, Boxing Queers, Micha Cárdenas, Cassils, Manuela Johanna Covini, Antoni Hervàs & WoMen Synchro, David Crespo, Tristan Deschamps, Jean-Úlrick Desert, Discover Football, Estelle Fenech, Caitlin D. Fisher, Zsuzsi Flohr/The Jewish Renaissance Boxing Club, Gabriele Fulterer & Christine Scherrer, GRRRLS* can skate, Barbara Gruhl, Guerreiras Project, Jason Hall, Tabea Huth, Justin Jorgensen, Brian Kenny, Lola Lasurt, Julia Lazarus, Llobet & Pons, Albert Markert, Marthe’Oh, Tara Mateik, Marisa Maza, Dayna McLeod, Stuart Meyers, David Miguel, Frank J. Miles, Maximilian Moll, Maria Molteni, Marc Ohrem-Leclef, Les Dégommeuses, Tanja Ostojić, Open Games, Max Pelgrims, Kathrin Rabenort, Rafucko, Saul Selles, Marc Serra, Coral Short, Julia Smit, Spielaufbau, Katja Stuke, Ilaa Tietz, Tools for Action/Artúr von Balen & QueerSport/ Željko Blaće, Alexa Vachon, Verena Melgarejo Weinandt, Tom Weller

(Above: NCAA invite the audience to use sidewalk chalk to re-imagine what the often corrupt athletic institutions in Germany/Europe should stand for. Occupy these acronyms/abbreviations with your own new phrases in the spirit of the New Craft Artists in Action)

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Hey Somerville. There’s a new spot in town that begs for artists and athletes to go HARDER in the paint!

Check out the basketball court mural executed by New Craft Artists in Action playas, directed and designed by Team Captain, Maria Molteni. This gem is a bright feature of a new arts/culture and athletic hangout on Somerville Ave. The "Clubhouse", an 18 month pop up and multi-use venue, was started just outside of Union Square by Chas Wagner. Chas called up the NCAA because he’d heard we had some things in common ; ) - the birth of an amazing new collaboration... 

Read more about our shared philosophy including “Participation over Spectatorship” in Emily Cassel’s Scout Somerville review/interview:

 Art and Athletics Meet at the Clubhouse 

With the help of Randi Shandroski, Giancarlo Corbacho, Alicia Casilio, and Molteni, we painted a full-scale half court topped off by Cara Kuball's sequined "Infinity" Net Work (a great compliment to the spray-spotted wall mural by Caleb Neelon). Soak it up and sink some baskets before this former auto-mechanic shop turns into more un-creative condos (or make some noise and advocate for space to stay and play).

Also proud to have some snaps in the Boston Globe!

A video posted by Maria Molteni (@strega_maria) on Apr 2, 2016 at 3:04pm PDT

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From The Mag: The night Whitney won SBXXV

Ten days after the U.S. entered into war, Whitney Houston didn't just sing the national anthem at Super Bowl XXV -- she owned it. This is the story of her moment in time.

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This week the New Craft Artists in Action descended upon our country’s Capitol. Invited by Fractured Atlas to present our work to the Congressional Maker Caucus, the NCAA participated in a “Making in the Arts” event in Washington, D.C. We were honored to be in the company of such organizations as the Congressional STEAM Caucus, National Endowment for the Arts among other great artists and DIY creative initiatives. Our newest team player Natalie Shields designed this cool poster for the event...

Below, see photos of our booth from the Maker Caucus event which included a presentation from the Caucus founder, Congressman Mark Takano, and a dunk test on one of our Net Works by Congressman Tim Ryan.

Our Capitol Hill debut came at a good time. Protests in resistance to the new Transpacific Partnership trade agreement took form on the Hill, across the country and the globe on February 4, when Obama signed the TPP to send it through Congress via Fast Track. The Congressional Maker Caucus and their monthly events focus on the makers movement and support innovative U.S. production in a time when much is outsourced to China. China is, however, excluded from the new TPP trade agreements which will include countries like Japan, Argentina, Chile, Singapore, Canada, Peru, and Brunei- many of which joined in protest. The TPP will very negatively affect many issues including workers rights and wages, climate change, sovereignty of nations, internet freedom, food safety, healthcare and financial regulation- prioritizing the interests of corporations over people. The TPP is described as having NAFTA’s problems, but on steroids.

In solidarity with the FLUSH THE TPP resistance and in support of the rights of citizens, particularly those who are working with their hands daily, the New Craft Artists in Action crafted a Net Work intervention to call attention to this very time sensitive issue. 

Using the fillet crochet technique, forming pixelated images in double-crocheted squares, NCAA players Taylor McVay (of Blueprints for Sewing) and Maria Molteni fabricated original “Flush the TPP” basketball nets. One was installed beside an active skate and graffiti park next to the “Capitalsaurus Court” playgrounds in Washington, DC. 

The other was installed on Buena Vista Avenue in Hampden, Baltimore where collective member Andrea Evans has resided since being appointed to teach at Maryland Institute College of Art.

Austin-based artist Tara Kirmse altered our official New Craft Artists in Action team jerseys, adding text from basketball terms- such as “Back Door Cut”, “Flagrant Foul”, and “Triple Threat”- that describe the behavior of unregulated corporations and Obama’s attempt to sneak the new trade deal through Fast Track. 

When a player shoots a basketball and it sort of rolls around the rim before dropping through the net that’s called “Flushing the Toilet”. 

A video posted by Maria Molteni (@misstint_molteni) on Feb 5, 2016 at 8:22am PST

The New Craft Artists in Action invite you to sniff out our new nets, dunk on the corporate lobby and FLUSH THAT TPP! PLEASE CALL YOUR LOCAL REPRESENTATIVES TO VOICE YOUR OPINION AND SIGN UP FOR NEWS VIA THE FLUSH THE TPP INITIATIVE. THIS MONTH IS CRITICAL FOR THE FUTURE.

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The New Craft Artists in Action are proud to announce that we’ll be presenting our work on Capitol Hill! Thanks to our newest NCAA Team Player and graphic designer <3 Natalie Shields <3 for creating our official flyer!

Fractured Atlas has invited our collective to participate in a Making in the Arts event hosted by the Congressional Maker Caucus. The event runs 4-6pm on Tuesday, February 2nd in Congress’ Rayburn House Office Building and includes other great art initiatives, universities and collectives such as STEAM America, Maryland Institute College of Art, and Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh. 

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Whew! The New Craft Artists in Action have been running sprints to prepare for the holiday season. It’s been a little over a year since we self-published our classic instruction manual Net Works but we already have a line of new goodies that would make EXCELLENT holiday gifts for a variety of folks. A list of hand crafted objects including team jerseys, posters, post cards, pennants and more will pique the interest of anyone interested in athletics, craft, history, feminism, and beyond.

We encourage everyone to chase us out to upcoming craft and book fairs or to place online orders. All money made from these sales are put toward new projects, shows, and community programming. This is what the NCAA operates off of! We recently updated our Square Store with new products so check it out.

The photos below show products in their context at the New York Art Book Fair (thanks to the Office of Culture and Design and Hardworking Goodlooking for sharing a corner of their booth) and Bust Magazine’s Bust Craftacular Boston. 

See above our new zine Sports Illustrated, Vol 1 created for the Field Days event last spring. 

See above: Clara and Maria chillin under some ceramic bball planters made in collaboration with Saint Karen BK. Macrame net/hangers crafted by NCAA’s Maria Molteni and Taylor McVay.

Taylor and Maria at the Bust Craftacular in the Cyclorama at the Boston Center for the Arts.

See Above: Smaller hand-painted pennants based on the set we made for Hoops: From Swoopes to Summit. These pennants feature names of African American women’s basketball teams that self organized and competed near the turn of the century.

And you can find us at two events next week: 

Fort Point Arts Community (FPAC)’s Holiday Pop Up // Envoy Hotel, Boston

Friday Dec 11, 4-8pm

Saturday Dec 12, 12-5pm

Odds and Ends // Yale Art Book Fair 

Yale University Art Gallery  New Haven, CT

Friday Dec 11, 11am-4:30pm 

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Way back in APRIL the NCAA got to participate in a miraculous 3-way event in Lost Angeles. Combining forces of Ooga Booga, Office of Culture and Design // Hardworking Goodlooking, and 356 Mission. Just getting around to posting the photos!

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OUTSIDE THE LINES // NCAA + ICA Boston’s Teen Arts Council

For this summer’s Teen Night, Maria Molteni and the NCAA were invited to collaborate with ICA Boston’s Teen Arts Council to create an immersive installation throughout the museum’s public spaces. This installation is inspired by the national Teen Convening conference theme “Outside the Lines” and brings together designs and ephemera from other fitting NCAA projects. Visual elements and activities playfully challenge and pull from an array of athletic tropes: high school spirit, athletic court designs, mediated movement in public spaces, and commercial sports identities. In these contexts, moving “Outside the Lines” is likened to thinking outside of the box- revolutionizing and rewriting the rules of the game according to the values and needs of a new generation of makers and players. Attendees were invited to explore the first floor of the ICA and engage in the following NCAA-hosted activities. (Click here for full fickr image set)

Full coverage of the 2015 Teen Convene at the ICA - Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston can be found on the NCAA’s Flickr.Teen art students from around the United States participate in the annual conference where they get to interact with each other and prominent, working contemporary artists to discuss how art has affected them and the role it can play in their lives as they become adults.

Photos by Kristyn Ulanday

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Check out an awesome new collaboration between NCAA’s Maria Molteni and ceramicist Saint Karen! Karen lives and works in Brooklyn making all sorts of wonderful sculptural and useful ceramic objects. She reached out to see if any of our playas could macrame some plant hangers for her orange and chrome planters and we jumped at the chance. You can buy her work as well as our nets from her site.

Be sure to check out the net that NCAA’s Taylor McVay made as well. Taylor sells her own handmade products under her clothing company Blue Prints for Sewing! 

[molteninetworks]

Montserrat Galleries has organized a series of four summer Pop-Up Exhibitions guest-curated by regional curators, artists and critics during the month of June. Each week will feature a new theme and a range of public programs.

Pam Campanaro invited the NCAA to take over the space for the week of June 22-26th. You’re invited to check out our participatory installation Field Days and encouraged to attend the Field Day Finale and closing reception on Thursday, June 25, 4-6pm.

For their Pop-Up, "Field Days", the NCAA will transform Montserrat Galleries into a vibrant Track-and-Field-inspired mixed-use recreational space. Often held in Spring at the end of the school year, the Field Day serves as a celebratory student utopia in an extracurricular autonomous zone. Such light-hearted competitions, separate in nature from gym class requirements or exclusive school sport championship, provide opportunities for students to participate in competitive physical challenges in a more open and collaborative environment. The NCAA's project will use the playful context of grammar school “Field Day” festivities, such as the three-legged race or balloon toss, as a jumping off point for performing absurdist and cross-disciplinary games that incorporate both athletic and craft-based skills.

In the days leading up to the exhibition reception, visitors are invited to explore the gallery "track and field" space through free-form, self-governed engagement. New Craft Artists in Action players Taylor McVay, Andrea Evans, and Maria Molteni will be busy on and off-site developing and publishing a new NCAA Field Day zine, featuring an essay by curator Pam Campanaro. At Thursday’s "Field Day Finale", guests are encouraged to participate in a variety of lively craft and athletic-based challenges for a chance to win NCAA books, jerseys, prints, and other wares. Visitors will be asked to consider the implications of the 'Home Court Advantage' in the context of their own comfort zones and athletic abilities. All ages and skill levels are welcome to join the fun: before events, Field Day participants will be given brief "Phys-Ed" training to “level the playing field” and provide them with basic skills to compete. Let the games begin!