Current Project
Overview
"These Hollow Hills" is part artist residency, part public programming, and part arts and culture festival. Melding art and activism, it will illuminate Western PA's role in shaping Appalachian cultural identity through art exhibitions, workshops, and events that engage our local communities. The project addresses the historical under representation of Western PA within the broader Appalachian narrative, empowering local artists and communities to celebrate their cultural contributions and initiate dialogues on socioeconomic, environmental, political, and folk themes specific to the region. Operating within a decolonial equity framework, the project challenges dominant narratives and elevates justice-minded perspectives in Appalachian cultural heritage work. We aim to reimagine Appalachian cultural traditions in a contemporary context that reflects the diversity of our local communities today.
With a multicultural, interdisciplinary artist residency running from September 2024 - 2025, folkLAB's ten resident artists will collaborate with local folk artisans, community leaders, historians, and activists through workshops and dialogues which will ultimately inspire the artists’ work.
Themes
“These Hollow Hills” will foster cross-cultural dialogue and create new, inclusive folk arts and traditions, centering five themes throughout the project:
Environmentalism & Ecology
Labor, Class & Economies
Folklore & Folk Arts
The Body & Sense of Self (e.g., healthcare, queer and gender narratives, mental health, accessibility)
Immigration, Race, & Place
We are collaborating with diverse arts, cultural, and community development organizations from across Western PA to bring this project to life. These collaborations facilitate resource sharing and inter-community networking, enhancing the project’s impact and success.
Putting it in motion
“These Hollow Hills” will unfold in four parts:
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Our artist’s kicked of their residency with a week of workshops, inspired by our five themese, in September 2024 at Sto-Rox Public Library and McKees Rocks, PA.
Next, they will reconvene to create and premiere their new, collaborative art work, inspired by the themeses in February/March 2025.
Finally, they will reunite to exhibit their work once more at the May 2025 festival.
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We will present free workshops inspired by our five themes to the public, in collaboration with Sto-Rox Public Library and other libraries in the Pittsburgh area.
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For two weekends in May 2025 we will be celebrating Appalachian art and culture of Western PA at the historic Pump House in Homestead, PA. With the support and collaboration of local and regional arts and community organizations, the festival will include a remounting of our residents' artwork, open exhibition space and an open stage programming curated with regional arts partners, and folk art market, and a chance for attendees to participate in communal art-making together.
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A selection of artworks for folkLAB's resident artists and local and regional art partners will tour regionally throughout Western PA, accompanied by screenings of the "These Hollow Hills" documentary in select locations.
Documenting the process
The project is also being documented by Studio Ragheb. The culminating documentary will chronicle the project’s evolution from inception to finish. It will serve as professional documentation for folkLAB and our artists’ portfolios as well as a stand-alone piece of storytelling in it’s own right.
This project is made possible by
A fiscally sponsored project of
The Rivers of Steel Heritage Corporation
Made possible by
in part, by state funds from The PA Council on the Arts.
This project is made possible
in part by federal funds from the Institute of Museum and Library Services administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education, Office of Commonwealth Libraries
Other Projects
The in Our Voice series (2017 - 2021)
The "in Our Voice" series curates small ensembles who each share an under-represented identity. folkLAB challenges the ensemble members to create a new performance piece inspired by the melding of folklore, myth, an archetypes of their choice with their personal narratives, identities, and their analysis of how these intersect. Each ensemble has about three weeks of devising and rehearsals to create their world-premiere, work-in-progress performance. The project culminates in one week of public performances. The artist and production staff share in ticket profits.
Paige Borak (Mother Page) and Asia Bey (Bean Girl) performing in FEMME (December 2017). Photo by Molly Derwig
Our first production and first installment of this series was FEMME: a new american folktale which was created by and featured an entirely female-identifying ensemble and premiered in December 2017 (pictured above) at The Glitter Box Theater in Pittsburgh, PA.
The second installment of the series, QUEER: new american tall tales featured an entirely queer identifying ensemble and production team and ran August 2018 at 3577 Studios in Pittsburgh, PA.
Princess Jafar as The Bird Lady of Pittsburgh in QUEER (August 2018)
The third installment, OTHER: multiracial folklore was created by a team of multiracial artists lead by folkLAB alum Kelsey Robinson and ran in December 2018 at Community Forge in Wilkinsburg, PA.
The cast of the immersive experience OTHER (December 2018) from left: Brenden Peifer, Jalina McClarin, Diane Ghogumo, Jason Gordon, and Kelsey Robinson (director)
The final installment, MADMay (2021) featured artist with personal mental health narratives and was conducted completely virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The miniMythologies residency (ongoing)
Puppet from The Ironweed Tales (May 2018) created by resident artist Felicia Cooper
miniMythologies is a residency series with the goal of creating new myths by promoting resident artists to explore their concepts of IDENTITY and MYTHOLOGY. folkLAB challenges each resident artist to incorporate a new skill within their discipline into their final product, Our first resident Felicia Cooper (www.feliciatcooper.com) was a Poconos native and Pittsburgh based puppeteer and performer. Felicia created The Ironweed Tales, a story of the women who champion the environmental justice movement in rural Appalachia told through live original music (composed by folk musician Juliana Carr), dance, found text and puppetry. The Ironweed Tales ran May/June 2018.
The second installment, mija: one bitch’s tale, was a one-woman show about activist, artist, and storyteller Nicole Gallagher’s life (follow Nicole’s storytelling work on Instagram with the #storiesinthetimeof) and was directed by Ayne Terceira (Uncumber Theatrics) and ran in August 2019.
If you’re interested in becoming a miniMythologies resident for miniMythologies III, e-mail folklab.series@gmail.com
Nicole Gallagher (creator) in mija: one bitch’s tale (August 2019) photo credit: Livy Ciotoli
Pandemic Era Projects
As the world adjusted to the uncertainty and tragedy of the COVID-19 pandemic, folkLAB found ways to bring artists together virtually and reach the communities we serve with material that responded to the pandemic (directly and indirectly).
We produce 3 virtual projects between 2020 - 2021.