Curatorial Tour & Closing: "We Mend in End Times" & "Family Ties"

Join us for the Curatorial Tour & Closing Reception for both of our current exhibitions, "We Mend in End Times" and "Family Ties"

Hosted by the Curators of We Mend in End Times, Izy Carney & Lucas J Rougeux

and the Curator of Family Ties: Thingumabob Self-Portraits, Thu Anh Nguyen

Join us for a special Curatorial Tour & Closing Reception for both exhibitions currently on display: We Mend in End Times in the Main Gallery and Family Ties: Thingumabob Self-Portraits. Explore the inspirations and ideas behind these thought-provoking exhibitions as the Curators share insights into the creation and impact.

ASL interpretation available for this event!

After the Curatorial Tour, we invite you to join the Curators and Featured Artists of both exhibitions for our Closing Reception to engage in conversation, ask questions, and experience the work from a fresh and personal perspective before closing.

Find out more about these exhibitions at dcartscenter.org

Gallery shot of We Mend in End Times, now on display in the Main Gallery at The DC Arts Center through Friday, March 13, 2026.

About We Mend in End Times

We Mend in End Times is a group exhibition stitching together themes of communal care, resilience, and personal tending for the body through the lens of textiles. Featuring a variety of unique processes and materials including quilt-making, screen-printing, stop motion, natural dyes, embroidery, and experimental sculpture, each artist uses their tender, meticulous and deeply personal material to process their experiences living in urgent times. This exhibition also features a hands-on Mending Table, an interactive installation where every visitor is invited to stitch, sew, or mend their mark on a growing community quilt. All materials are provided, but you're free to bring your own as well!

Over the course of the show, the quilt will become a living tapestry of collective care and shared intention. At the close of the exhibition, the completed piece will be raffled to benefit Good Trouble Co-Op, a Columbia Heights mutual aid organization.

Gallery shot of Family Ties: Thingumabob Self-Portraits, now on display in the Main Gallery at The DC Arts Center through Friday, March 13, 2026

About Family Ties: Thingumabob Self-Portraits

Family Ties: Thingumamob Self-Portraits featuring work by Hyunsuk Erickson features multimedia drawings of her Thingumabob sculptures. The “Thingumabob” is a collective, reflective of each figure's own lived, cultural experience of confusion of identity, and adaptation in a melting pot society. Consider that the Thingumabob sculptures are a community made with traditional fiber arts techniques, ceramic, wood, PVC, and repurposed materials — these drawings of ink, colored pencil, and marker are their portraits of themselves.

Each portrait highlights what is unique about the Thingumabobs: their undulating and colorful shapes, and the way they form different intergenerational tribes. The self-portraits are also an incomplete snapshot of a Thingumabob in action; they continue beyond the frame, and their stories are still evolving. Although these are self-portraits, no Thingumabob is alone, and many overlap. These self-portraits, like their sculptural counterparts, are a reminder of the interconnectedness within and between communities.