This episode focuses on the various registers of emptiness across the built environment, and is apart of our 2023–2024 research theme: On the Ground. The void is unpacked as spatial absences, erasure, unmet potential, permissive emptiness, liberating silences, and capital-driven failure. We explore the many languages of vacancy in New York City in dialogue with other socio-political contexts with shared challenges.Dominique Petit-Frère from Limbo Accra talks about Into the Void, a digital project aimed at archiving West Africa’s unfinished property developments and revitalizing their existence through collectivity and embracing liminal space. Dragonfly (aka Robin LaVerne Wilson)—member of The Stop Shopping Choi—brings us into The Earth Chrxch. Writer Jeremiah Moss reads an excerpt from Feral City, a book they published in 2022 about life in New York City during the COVID-19 pandemic. Artists Tom Burr and Carlos Motta think about voids in their multiple possibilities and what it means in the context of queer life. Artist Igancio Gatica has a conversation with Martha Snow from the Urban Design Forum and Gina Lee from the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development about their studies on the hidden stories of city vacancies and their potential. Dia Art Foundation curator, Jordan Carter, reads an excerpt from a text by Glenn Ligon published in Artforum in September 2004, titled Black Light: David Hammons and The Poetics of Emptiness. Collaged within the episode are clips from archival videos and audio from artists Amanda Williams, Gordon Matta-Clark, June Jordan, Zoe Leonard, and Francisca Benítez. This episode was originally published through Montez Press Radio.SOUND CREDITS:The Peoples’ Forum (Director). (2023). BOOK TALK: Care: The Highest Stage of Capitalism with Premilla Nadasen and Ujju Aggarwal Red Canary Song (Director). (2022). Fly In PowerBliss, Jenna (Director). (2018). The People’s’ Detox Global Cities Local Streets (Director). (2015). Orchard Street, New York Center for Puerto Rican Studies – Centro (Director). (2017). The Bodega: A Cornerstone of Puerto Rican Barrios Tayob, Huda. (2015). Architectures of Care

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