a stone from our land builds the ceiling of our sky
Co-Curated with Saba Maheen
A Stone From Our Land Builds the Ceiling of Our Sky is a participatory Fluxus-inspired installation that reclaims the act of stone throwing as a gesture of rebellion, survival, and liberation. Drawing from histories in which stones function as both weapon and symbol, the work reframes this act not as violence, but as an assertion of presence against erasure.
Visitors are invited to throw pigment-laden rubber balls at the walls of the gallery. Each impact leaves a trace, marking the space through collective, bodily action. Over time, the gallery walls accumulate stains and splashes, transforming the pristine exhibition space into a site shaped by repeated gestures of resistance.
Running along the lower perimeter of the walls are lines from a poem by Ramzy Baroud, grounding the work in lived histories and political memory. Positioned near the floor, the text echoes how stories of struggle are often overlooked, stepped over, or silenced, yet remain foundational.
The title invokes a paradox: what is taken from the land and thrown upward becomes the structure that defines our sky. In this way, the work suggests that acts of defiance, however small or dismissed, accumulate into architectures of collective meaning. The installation exists not as a fixed object, but as an unfolding record of participation, where each mark insists on the right to leave evidence, to be seen, and to shape space.
Exhibition show: "The Co-curate Shows" September 2025, Mason Gross Galleries, New Brunswick, NJ
