March 8, 2024

A collaboration between Transformer and The Embassy of Iceland

Icelandic design teams Flétta and Ýrúrarí will open Pizza Time, co-presented by Transformer, a Washington, D.C.-based 501c3 non-profit visual arts organization that connects, elevates, and serves a diversity of emerging artists across innovative global exhibition and program platforms. Guests can order freshly felted wool pizza slices made of leftovers from the Icelandic wool industry. This

The scene of the design performance is built like a small pizza place where customers can see the felted pizza slices being made. Guests can participate by ordering a slice from the menu or selecting toppings to customize the order to their taste and bring home a one-of-a-kind wool pizza slice.

JUNE 4 – 30, 2022

A collaboration between Transformer and The IceBox Collective.

The Nomadic House, as a symbol of home and shelter, evokes issues emerging around quarantine, climate crisis, conflict, and displacement. The concept of home, homelessness, transience - being rooted or unrooted - are increasingly threatened, as we watch the war in Ukraine unfold. The Nomadic House can manifest as a mobile shrine, a contemporary museum, a community space, a meditation space, a place for critical thought and healing dialogue.

Transformer is providing an activation site for The Nomadic House, collaborating on programming to catalyze dialogue and action to benefit the victims of the war, both in the immediate and in the aftermath when the conflict no longer occupies the headlines, supporting displaced communities and people trying to restart their lives.

February 16 – 20, 2022

Featuring photographs by Leslie Clague, Cynthia Connolly, and Farrah Skeiky

Victor Koroma
Spin Concept Series
October, 2020

Transformer is thrilled to grow our partnership with The Asbury Hotel in support of emerging visual artists. The presentation of Victor Koroma's Spin Concept Series builds upon The Asbury Hotel's support of Transformer's Siren Arts summer residency progam & performance art series, featuring an evolving & diverse roster of dynamic emerging visual artists based within the northeast corridor of Washington, DC to NYC.

A Sister Cities Project Presented by Transformer
SISTER CITIES EXCHANGE: MAY – AUGUST 2020
ONLINE EXHIBITION: AUGUST 17 – SEPTEMBER 12, 2020

Mapping the Future World – a Sister Cities project supported by the DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities. Connecting Korean and DC artists through a series of online conversations & digital communications, Mapping the Future World is building dialogue, connectedness, inspiration, insight and artwork to make sense of, and move forward in, this uncertain and unprecedented time.

Mapping the Future World is supported by a grant from the DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities’ Sister Cities International Art Grant.

September 2 – 12, 2020

As we approach fall, Transformer takes a look back at our innovative summer 2020 programs through a special Summer 2020 Replay Showcase.

Tune in here from September 2 through September 12, to explore our summer 2020 series of artist exchanges, conversations, performances, new artworks, and collector views - all supporting emerging artists and engaging audiences in new & best practices in contemporary visual art.

July, 2020

As part of Transformer's mission to support artists, and in our continued efforts to be nimble and responsive to our DC community, we are honored to support Radical Plywood, an initiative of Radical Empathy, an events and activations startup created by DC resident Tarek Kouddous that targets underutilized and vacant spaces around the District. Radical Plywood is a direct response to DC businesses who boarded up their storefronts the first week of June amid protests against anti-black racism and police brutality. Seeking to fill the community with radical messages of hope and build awareness and voice for people aren't having their voices heard, Transformer collaborated with Logan Circle Main Street to provide artist honoraria for murals created throughout Transformer's Logan Circle neighborhood by artists: Leila Spolter, Timothy Cunningham, Musah Swallah, Ragda Noah, Francesca Lee Falvo, Zoe McCarthy, Dominique Homza, and Kelly Towles.

June - July, 2020

Mindful of the unique hardships emerging artists – and in particular emerging Black Artists and Artists of Color – face as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Transformer is providing need-based, unrestricted relief grants of $500 to 20 emerging artists in DC experiencing financial hardship due to the pandemic.

—— APPLICATION CLOSED——

Deadline to Apply | Sunday, July 5 at 11:59pm EST

Practicing emerging visual artists living in the DC Metro Area (DC, Arlington, Alexandria, Fairfax, Montgomery or Prince George’s counties) are eligible to apply. Applicants must be 21 or older and able to receive taxable income in the United States regardless of their citizenship status.

RELIEF GRANT FUNDS will be distributed to selected artists beginning July 13.

The applicant review committee includes Artists Sustaining Artists participating artist Zoë Charlton, Transformer Board Member Sheldon Scott, and Transformer Co-Founder & Executive/Artistic Director Victoria Reis.

Support for the relief grants come from Transformer's Artists Sustaining Artists Program. As Transformer Board & staff continue to grow support for this initiative, Transformer will be able to offer this funding to more artists.

June, 2020

MEDIA: Press Release

Transformer is proud to present Artists Sustaining Artists, an initiative intended to provide financial support to emerging artists negatively impacted by COVID-19. This initiative is being led by Transformer Board and staff, with artworks curated by Transformer Board Members Christopher Addison of Addison/Ripley, artist Sheldon Scott, and Transformer’s Executive & Artistic Director Victoria Reis.

Selected artists who are sustained in their careers have been invited to donate an artwork that will be sold to support their emerging peer artists.

All sale proceeds will support Transformer and the emerging artists the organization serves. 70% of sale proceeds will be distributed to emerging artists in the form of unrestricted microgrants and artist honorariums. The remaining 30% of sale proceeds will go toward supporting Transformer operations. This initiative will support the DC creative community. All participating artists generously donating artworks are DC-based, and funds will go towards supporting DC-based artists.

All participating artists generously donating artworks are DC-based, and funds will go towards supporting DC-based artists. Thank you to the following artists for donating their artwork:
Christopher Baer
Julia Bloom
Thomas Bunnell
Zoë Charlton
Frank Day
Tim Doud
Carol Brown Goldberg
Mira Hecht
Max Hirshfeld
Imar Hutchins
Dean Kessmann
Micheline Klagsbrun
Isabel Manalo
Tom Meyer
Chris Mills
Nan Montgomery
E. Brady Robinson
Jennifer Sakai
Sheldon Scott
Luis Silva
Lou Stovall
Dan Treado
Julie Wolfe
Trevor Young

March 22 - May 30, 2020

Transformer’s Artist On-Line Caravanserai initiative expanded upon Which Yesterday is Tomorrow? concepts of gathering people for exchange of ideas. Transformer invited 11 artists to take over our Instagram story to visually share their insight, ideas and inspiration toward building connectivity.

Many thanks to Artist On-Line Caravanserai participating artists: Dahlia Elsayed & Andrew Demirjian, Andrea Polichetti, Alexis Gomez, Sheida Soleimani, Michelle Luong, Aristeidis Lappas, DJ Nikilad, Samera Paz, Helene Garcia, and Maps Glover.

March 30 - April 3, 2020

Phone Call brings together poets and artists in immediate response to the shutdowns surrounding COVID-19 in an effort to connect people during a time of isolation. Inspired, in-part, by the late John Giorno’s Dial-a-Poem, Yoko Ono’s Telephone Piece, and Nigel Shafran’s series Ruth on the phone, Phone Call aims to reconnect people within intimate space of a phone call on a 1-to-1 level. Participants can sign up to be read to and hold conversations with poets and artists over the phone.

Conceived by Ginevra Shay, Phone Call is part of the nomadic project Rose Arcade, and supported by Transformer. Through Phone Call, Transformer will be providing funding to more than 20 artists, and connection to more than 200 participants.

With your support, our goal is to grow this program, funding more artists and providing Phone Call more people in the community.

SPRING/BREAK Art Show NYC 2020, In Excess

March 4-9, 2020 11am-8pm
Room 1136
625 Madison Avenue New York, NY 10022

Vanishing Points is a multimedia installation incorporating projected video and sculpture created with a mass of single-use consumer items which responds to this year's SPRING/BREAK curatorial theme, In Excess. The work embraces a baroque style established 450 years ago - noted also as the duration that it takes for plastic consumables to biodegrade. This aesthetic equates opulence with exalted divinity and culturally significant as a symbol of wealth and power, or the desire for it. This value system has permeated our daily lives as conspicuous consumption accelerates the certainty of our destruction. The installation further includes a soundscape composed by the musician and artist kev.om.era (Kevin O'Meara), creating a fully immersive experience.

Rachel Schmidt is interested in futuristic visions of a world without a natural ecosystem, where synthetic biology governs how people relate and coexist. Her work explores how a vanishing ecosystem will manifest itself in the awareness and scarcity of material use. She uses time-based media and installation to explore urbanization and its impact on ecosystems, future landscapes, and the role that myth plays in our understanding of the environment. Rachel received her MFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art. She has exhibited throughout the US and internationally, and has been reviewed in Sculpture Magazine, Washington Post, and numerous other print and online publications. She is an installation artist based in Washington, DC.

October 31 – November 4, 2018

Union Market’s Dock 5

Transformer is pleased to present UNSETTLED – a performance art series curated for "Superfine! The Fair by Victoria Reis, Founder and Director of Transformer. UNSETTLED features performances by a select group of leading DC based emerging artists – Hoesy Corona, Rex Delafkaran, Maps Glover, Kunj, and Tsedaye Makonnen – each of whom are pushing performance art forward with their innovative, interdisciplinary work.

Previously presented in Miami and New York, with upcoming manifestations in Los Angeles, "Superfine! The Fair – created in 2015 by James Miille, an artist, and Alex Mitow, an arts entrepreneur – makes its DC premiere October 31 to November 4, 2018, at Union Market’s Dock 5 event space, featuring 300 visual artists from DC and beyond who will present new contemporary artwork throughout 70+ curated booths. "Superfine! The Fair also features emerging collector events, tours, film screenings and panels. superfinedc.eventbrite.com

Always seeking new platforms to connect & promote DC-based emerging artists with their peers and supporters, and new opportunities to increase dialogue among audiences about innovative contemporary art practices, Transformer is excited to present UNSETTLED at "Superfine! The Fair UNSETTLED curator and Executive & Artistic Director of Transformer Victoria Reis states: “"Superfine! The Fair at Union Market’s Dock 5 presents an opportunity for Transformer to advance our partnership based mission, expand our network, and further engage with a growing new demographic of DC art collectors and contemporary art enthusiasts. UNSETTLED highlights a select group of dynamic, DC-based emerging artists at the forefront of quickly evolving performance art practice, who are representative of the vibrant creative energy Transformer works to cultivate throughout our exhibitions and programs.”

Summer 2018

Farragut Square Park
17th & K Street NW, Washington, DC

Transformer is honored to present Crochet Jam – a social practice art initiative created by San Francisco, CA-based fiber & textile artist Ramekon O’Arwisters in 2012, to engage audiences in the role of art within the community and the power of art within society. A public, art-making event that's embracing and inclusive, with no attempt made to dictate the creative process nor judge the finished project – Crochet Jam is a meditative, liberating, and empowering participatory experience.

Crochet Jam is rooted in artist Ramekon O’Arwisters’ cherished childhood memory steeped in the African-American tradition of weaving, in a calm and non-judgmental environment without rules or limitations: “When I was growing up in North Carolina, I helped my paternal grandmother, Celia Jones Taylor (1896–1982) make quilts. Quilt-making with her is one of my fondest childhood memories. With her, I was embraced, important, and special. I was a little black boy hiding my queer self from my family during the harsh reality of the Jim Crow South during the 1960s, and before the turbulent years of the Civil Rights Movement that spread throughout the country.” – Ramekon O’Arwisters. Ramekon decided to start a community art project that enables groups of people to collectively work on a piece of art with a focus on relaxation and human connection, done in public with strangers.

Independent Art Fair
MAY 2018
Athens, Greece

Transformer is proud to feature artists Hoesy Corona, Rex Delafkaran, & Kunj at the 2018 Platforms Project: Independent Art Fair in Athens, Greece! Presenting 2D, 3D and performative works from each of the three artists in booth #28 during the weekend of May 18-20, 2018.

Through the support of the DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities Sister Cities grant award, Transformer expands upon our comprehensive international artistic & cultural exchange programming to achieve creative and professional growth experience for the participating DC artists to advance their artistic careers and expand their international contemporary art audiences.

Through the development of relationships with artists and art spaces in Athens, Greece, as well as developing relationships with internationally based peer artists, art spaces, and galleries participating in Platforms Project, Transformer is proud to provide these DC artists access to an understanding of new and best practices within the global contemporary visual arts field, while developing relationships that will propel them in their artistic careers.

Established 2018

with Full Service Radio

Poster Making with Exile Books

January 21, 2016

Transformer was proud to partner with EXILE Books (Miami, FL) to distribute artist-made multilingual posters in support of The Women's March on Washington on Saturday, January 21, 2017.

October 02 – 05, 2014

Capitol Skyline Hotel - Room 230

Transformer is proud to present new works on paper by FlatFile artists Megan Mueller, Ziad Nagy and Bonner Sale in Room 230 at the 4th Annual (e)merge art fair at the Capitol Skyline Hotel.

Transformer’s FlatFile Program is an evolving collection of works in a variety of two-dimensional mediums including photography, painting, drawing, collage, hand silkscreens and prints approximately 16 x 20” in size and smaller. Featuring more than 200 works by mostly DC based emerging artists, the program includes artists that have exhibited with Transformer in the past and those who are new to Transformer. Works from the FlatFile have been featured in numerous international exhibitions and art fairs, and are available for viewing and purchase at Transformer on an on-going basis. Ongoing selections of FlatFile artworks are also featured and available for purchase at Transformer’s FlatFile Store on our website: http://www.transformerdc.org/artsale/overview

For Transformer’s 4th year exhibiting in the (e)merge art fair, we highlight three exceptional FlatFile artists and their works on paper. In addition to their works currently in our FlatFile, each of the three artists Transformer will be presenting have created new work specifically for the (e)merge art fair. While each of these artists’ approaches are diverse, their combined abstract, fantastical, and conceptual aesthetics create a fluid dialogue between the works.

(e)merge Exhibition Hours: Friday, October 3 and Saturday, October 4, 12-7pm, Sunday, October 5, 12-5pm.

Transformer features artists Mariah Anne Johnson, Andrew Kozlowski and Heather Ravenscroft + selected works from our FlatFile program in Rooms 201 & 202 at the 2nd Annual (e)merge art fair!

Transformer is excited to present DC based artists Mariah Anne Johnson and Heather Ravenscroft, and Alabama based artist Andrew Kozlowski, in the 2012 (e)merge art fair. Each of these artists brings a unique approach to the idea of mapping with the new works they have created specifically for Transformer’s participation in (e)merge. Johnson’s dense stacks of perfectly folded bed sheets and pillow cases convey the idea of sedimentary mappings, while Kozlowski and Ravenscroft’s drawing and prints are reminiscent of deconstructed road and treasure maps. Kozlowski works directly with roadway imagery in screen-printing while Ravenscroft eludes to animal burrows and tracks in her ink and colored pencil drawings.

March 20 – July 1, 2012 at numerous sites and event based performances in the Federal District and surrounding areas in the former Union state of Maryland and former Confederate state of Virginia.

With this project, Office of Experiments are creating a distributed artwork in which 1000 vials of symbolic tears, collected water from Japan, will be used to water some of the 3000 Cherry Trees donated to Washington, DC by Tokyo 100 years ago. A temporary lab at Transformer on P Street will display the 1000 vials, which will then be distributed by volunteers. Mapped and documented online, the distribution of these vials address both the intimacy and scale of this disaster that transgresses the territories of society and culture. Further information and limited edition prints will also be available at Transformer.

A relational art piece and emotional catalyst connecting visitors with tsunami victims. Office of Experiments' temporary lab space at Transformer acts as a center of activity: offering prints to visitors in exchange for a donation to tsunami charities and displaying 1000 vials - symbolic tears collected from Japan. Volunteers will pour drops from vials, numbered and trackable online, as offerings of remembrance onto cherry blossom trees across the city. Further performative interventions at federal and global media sites throughout DC will be announced at www.the1x1project.com

More about the Project: https://officeofexperiments.net/on-experiment/1x1project/ & https://nealwhite.org/1-x1-Project

Curator: Steve Rowell
Images: Neal White / The Office of Experiments

Transformer was the first organization to present "A Fire in My Belly" in a direct and immediate response to the Smithsonian's censorship of a 4-minute edited version pulled from the Hide/Seek exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery.

Screened on a continual loop in Transformer's store-front window space on Dec. 1-2, 2010, and in honor of World AIDS Day & Day With(out) Art, Transformer is proud to have initiated early further dialogue around this work and its censoring.

In addition to the initial screening of A Fire in My Belly, Transformer continued its efforts to promote dialogue around these events:

December 2, 2010
Transformer organized an artistic action for Dec. 2, 2010, in which 100 people marched to the steps of the National Portrait Gallery in silent protest of the Smithsonian's censorship of the work.

Transformer issued a letter to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, G. Wayne Clough calling on him to reinstate the work.

December 3, 2010
Transformer began showing the entire thirty-minute Wojnarowicz work in progress with unique permission from his Estate, and continued screening through February 4, 2011. Displayed on Transformer's storefront was the Day With(out) Art symbol and the following text:

A Fire in My Belly
Video by David Wojnarowicz (1954 – 1992)
Created in 1987, Censored by the Smithsonian Institution 2010

December 20, 2010
In collaboration with writer/activist Catherine V. Dawson and Transformer, the Washington DC JCC hosted hide/SPEAK a conversation with Hide/Seek co-curator David C, Ward and others, to discuss the events that led up to the Smithsonian's removal of David Wojnarowicz's A Fire in My Belly video from the exhibition and the social and political implications of the situation. Click here for video of the event.

January. 28, 2011
Transformer co-signs a letter written by the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) urging the Smithsonian Board of Regents to adopt policies upholding First Amendment principles.

January 31, 2011
Art+, with support from Transformer and the Museum of Censored Art, organized a protest at the Smithsonian Castle during the Board of Regents meeting, calling on the Smithsonian to remove Secretary Clough from office.

Action March 26, 2011 - Culture Wars: Then and Now
Transformer presented a day-long symposium in collaboration with the Corcoran Gallery of Art and the Corcoran College of Art + Design with talks and panels on censorship, arts activism, and arts funding.

August 26-28, 2008

The Floating Lab Collective set up a series of objects within Transformer’s project space, encouraging visitors to take an object in exchange for an object they leave behind.

To document and archive the exchanges, a Floating Lab Collective artist on site made quick drawings of each item and recorded its known history. Floating Lab Collective said: “The purpose of bartering in this instance is to subvert both its semantic value and the traditional context of the art object as mercantile in nature. This project places the object in a social interstice, basically removed from the law of profit by emphasizing the sociability of the object in the context of bartering.”

August 8-26, 2008

John James Anderson's video work Moment of Zen: Meeting Buddha in the Road was featured in Transformer's storefront window. "In the video the protagonist focuses on his concept of nothingness – television static – and believes himself enlightened" says Anderson, " -- before realizing that the television and his concept is nothing more than a false Buddha." For more information about John James Anderson and to purchase DVDs of Moment of Zen: Meeting Buddha in the Road, please contact the artist directly at: johnjamesanderson@gmail.com

August 2 - 9, 2003
Ingrid Hagerstrom

The end of a four-part seasonal art action created for Transformer by artist-in-residence Ingrid Hagerstrom.

Ingrid Hagerstrom

The third installment of a three-part seasonal art action created for Transformer by artist-in-residence Ingrid Hagerstrom.

April 19, 2003 - April 26, 2003
Organized with DC Hope Collective

Featuring artists: Virginia Blanca Arrsueño, Bonnie Crawford, Chuck Sehman, Ben Tolman, Kelly Towles, & Partrick Young