Photographed by Avery Savage

As part of our ongoing collaboration with The Shed to spotlight artists from the Open Call: Portals exhibition (June 27–August 24), SHEER spent time inside the immersive installation of visual artist, writer, and producer Marwa Eltahir: 99 Names: My Liberation Is Tied To Yours.

Her installation creates a sacred, sensory space for reflection. Modeled after majlis-style communal seating found along sub-Saharan caravan routes, the work invites audiences to rest on woven rugs beneath sheer white curtains, surrounded by sound, stillness, and prayer. A projected film plays in a loop, opening with the Azan and unfolding into spoken word narration and original composition.

film, healing art, visual activismBianca Jean-PierreJuly 24, 2025spirituality, filmmaker, Sudan, The Shed, Open CallComment

ARTIST & DESIGNER TO KNOW: MEL CORCHADO

Photography by Avery Savage

SHEER had the chance to visit the Brooklyn studio of fashion designer and artist Mel Corchado ahead of her exhibition debut. Mel’s practice is rooted in slowness and intention. Whether she’s sewing by hand, gathering with community, or experimenting with unconventional materials like sugar, her work invites us to think beyond product and into process, care, and cultural memory.

Her installation for Portals, titled $TICKY $IN$, features garments made of hardened sugar. These glimmering, fragile structures explore the material’s ties to colonial labor, Puerto Rican identity, and the shifting nature of time. In person, they feel less like clothes and more like quiet vessels of transformation.

FILMMAKERS TO KNOW: AISHA AMIN

Aisha Amin is an NYC-based artist and filmmaker born in Nairobi, Kenya of Pakistani descent. Aisha’s work explores and highlights overlooked communities including those struggling with the presence of gentrification in their neighborhood.