CEC Artslink Collaboration
SHORT BLURB NEEDED
The Talking Peers program, conceived by ACAF board directors Leeza Ahmady, Megha Ralapati, and Christopher Ho, facilitates collaborative engagements among Asia-based and Asian diaspora artists, curators, and educators. This initiative aims to activate, empower, and revitalize professional networks by cultivating artistic connections and establishing expansive peer-to-peer mentorship structures. The program seeks to provide a dynamic platform for creative professionals, fostering collaboration across art collectives, institutions, and academia at both local and global levels.
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Talking Peers aims to forge connections between diverse artistic communities through this inclusive approach, manifested in various formats that emulate the experience of a studio visit. The emphasis is on sharing and communicating the creative process, resources, knowledge, and wisdom rather than the final artwork or project exhibition. This multifaceted approach fosters meaningful connections and weaves a diverse fabric of collaborative growth, satisfaction, and abundance, sparking renewed creativity and fostering professional development among participants.
Yasi Alipour, The Pleasure of Futile Cycles, 2022.
ACAF outreached to their network of artists and art professionals to encourage a fellowship with CEC Artslink, a program dedicated to supporting individuals whose work expands audiences’ awareness, understanding, and perceptions of social, political, and environmental issues. From ACAF’s network, CEC Artslink selected Yama Rahimi and Nabila Horakhsh to participate in a research residency in the United States to engage connections with people, archives, collections, and other resources relevant to expanding their practices.
During his fellowship with CEC Artslink in 2024 sponsored by Magnum Foundation, Yama Rahimi, contemporary artist and activist whose practice spans video art, conceptual photography, and experimental short film, _______. Through the support of ACAF, Yama Rahimi applied for and was selected out of 500 applicants to curate an exhibit with ApexArt in New York City that will open in January 2026. The exhibition titled, “Surviving Shadows - Afghan Art in the Face of Suppression” will focus on the harsh new reality faced by Afghan artists since the Taliban’s takeover, presenting images of destroyed artworks, pieces that remain in Afghanistan, art smuggled out of the country, and the works of Afghan artists in exile.
Nabila Horakhsh, contemporary artist, curator, and co-founder of Berang Arts, was selected as a 2026 CEC Artslink International Fellow and will reside in the US to continue her exploration of _______.
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