Photos by Stacie Joy
"Fridge Street: Bridging Sites of Mutual Aid," a new exhibit at the Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space (MoRUS), explores the community fridges that emerged in New York City amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Here's more about the work, curated by (from left) Yiya Wang, Xiran Luo and Xiaoya Yuan...
"Fridge Street" dives into the network of community fridges across New York City as they work toward food security, community building and sustainable practices.With primary and secondary data gathered from volunteering, field trips, questionnaires, interviews, and literature over the past six months, "Fridge Street" archives the network of community fridges across New York City.
Through visual representations, individual narratives, and interactive displays, the exhibit showcases the resilience and resourcefulness of communities, providing visitors with an understanding of mutual aid within this grassroots movement.Ultimately, "Fridge Street" hopes to call attention to food insecurity as a systemic problem and inspire action that helps build more just and inclusive food systems.
Here are a few photos from the opening last Saturday...
MoRUS is at 155 Avenue C between Ninth Street and 10th Street.
8 comments:
Love this concept of helping others who are in need out.
Nice concept - less than stellar execution. Sidewalk "vendors" on 14th between 1st & A often take food from the fridges and attempt to sell it.
And nothing is being done. Why?
@10:26 sadly you are correct but I didn’t want to mention the negative side of this. There are more people in need than opportunist.
And what do you suggest the fridges do?
How about not allowing all the stolen non food items from being sold on the street It be better to have more food pantries than community fridges
Yes, this is a problem, but it's not like those people won't be selling all the things they steal throughout the neighborhood anyway. That thieves' market antedates the EV fridge and it won't go away if the fridge does. I feel like obvious perishables are less resellable than staples (who wants milk that's been sitting out in the sun for who knows how long) and therefore maybe better donations for that fridge.
Fridges are one way of getting food to people who have trouble coping with the more bureaucratic ways of getting help. They have their weaknesses, just like every method does, and they would not work as a universal means of feeding people. But they represent an important community impulse to take care of each other.
The resale of donated items led me to switch my donations to home-baked items -- mostly cake, cookies and pie, with the occasional roll with cheese. Everything is carefully packaged and labeled with the ingredients and the note "home baked". The nature of the fridge is that I can't usually tell what people think, but a few times I've gotten positive feedback and it always disappears quickly.
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