Here Where The Body Knows It Can Hurt
Vox Populi
319 N 11th St.
Philadelphia
July 30, 2026
As a regular in a coffee establishment, there’s no honor greater than a beloved barista breaking the fourth wall. I don’t exactly remember what prompted this breach between Greg and I — I think it may have been us both being involved with Vox Populi to some degree (him, being a current member; me, having exhibited work there recently). In this social breach, he told me that he was in the throes of curating something there, and though I couldn’t submit any works myself, we kept up in discussion of show's process, reviewing the entries (over 150!) and talking about how installation was going whenever I’d stop by for a late morning brewski at Greg’s place of work.
Months of this work resulted in HERE WHERE THE BODY KNOWS IT CAN HURT, a juried exhibition of around 40 artists “ruminating on the paradox of foodcraft.” The show highlights artworks that “move in the negative space between recipe, sculpture, language, trade skill, and performance.” On a recent afternoon I made my way to Callowhill to see the exhibition in the flesh for the first time and to listen to a few of the artists speak on their contributions. Upon exiting the elevator on the gallery floor, I turned to see a mini bar, manned by Greg serving up hot and iced coffee he’d made that morning.
I snagged an iced coffee and found that there was just enough time to walk through the exhibition before the discussion began. It was a full show; some artworks connected to the themes in ways that weren't immediately apparent to me; some I only understood after hearing from the artists themselves. There were sculptural works; photographs; whole installations. I was impressed by the range on display and the balance of more abstract approaches to the theme with more literal ones: a visualization of labor in the form of massive pile of shucked oyster shells in a corner of Vox where piles of things often seem to end up; a spiked pickle-like object resting atop a filing cabinet; a blown-up recipe for Asparagi a la Milanese and a photography series documenting a melon harvest. There was also a piece that invited audience participation, ‘Practice Carrying a Body,’ in which visitors could pick up a sandbag of around 40 pounds and carry it through the space to then drop off in a designated spot, making note of how and where their body ached as they carried this weight.
After a bit, we were corralled into the ‘Black Box,’ a small dark room enclosed by curtains where video works are normally shown at Vox. Through the length of the room was a dining table covered with white table linen and small silver vessels. The set-up invited us to chat with one another while waiting for the event to begin. At the head of the table, on a laptop and the big screen, was a Zoom call of artists who were unable to attend the talk in person.
Five artists spoke with us: Giacomo Lupo Valerin (sculpture/ceramics), Zainab Zulfiqar (multimedia), Misha Oraa Ali (sculpture/ceramics), Lauren Deal (performance), Andrew Black (sculpture/ceramics), Tom Stockton (photography) and Siqi Fan (performance).
The walk through itself reflected the labor of service work: Blanche, the Executive Director of Vox Populi, held the laptop of artists like a fine dining platter, *wearing many hats* as a “server,” photographer and transcriber whenever we had tech issues; the attendees were on our feet for most of the time (some of us indulging in a squatting position any chance we got), fanning ourselves to try and overcome the warmth of the space.
Each artist got the opportunity to speak, and a wide range of thoughts and ideas were shared: their/our connection to Earth and relation to the beings that live on/in it; the honoring of personal relationships; the trans & queer experience; testing the limits of our bodies and endurance; function, form and intention; what happens when we gather communally and; how it feels to be othered as a service worker in communal spaces.
Some take a piece of the exhibition text as a guide: “Salt is a talisman. Salt is a mirror. Salt is a weapon.” Salt was used in the glaze of certain ceramics to create a beautiful iridescent sheen, such as it was on Misha’s chess set, while Tom used salt to directly manipulate their photography.
We returned to the Black Box dining hall, watched a bit of video from the opening night of Siqi’s piece, in which they fried and served lotus root to guests under a recording of the noise of a working kitchen, blurring the lines of work and performance.
The event ended with the remainder of us making our way back around the coffee bar for our last beverages before we parted, reflecting with each other and chatting about the accessibility of creation and translating our daily performances into an art that can be digested. I’m left ruminating over the kinds of labor we enact in our lives; at the workplace, in service to our loved ones, in devotion to our crafts. Regardless of what it is or how, we could follow Greg’s suggestion to “Make it hot. Make it to stay.”
HERE WHERE THE BODY KNOWS IT CAN HURT closes in a few days on Sunday, August 2nd. Go see it while you can!
