The ferocious feminine

When Providence College Galleries canceled their show about healing, care, and ancestors, they took their art and their care elsewhere

Feda Eid, Shey Rivera Ríos, and Luana Morales. All photos courtesy Shey Rivera Ríos.

This spring, a Providence exhibition all about softness, acceptance, and healing was body-blocked by institutional resistance.

Shey “Rí Acu” Rivera Ríos worked with Providence College Galleries to mount “Nothing Living Lives Alone” in late March. The title comes from an essay that leadership expert Margaret Wheatley wrote in 2001 for Shambhala Sun magazine in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks:

“Everything takes form from relationships, be it subatomic particles sharing energy or ecosystems sharing food. In the web of life, nothing living lives alone.”

Wheatley writes about deep listening as a means of connection, but perhaps the university didn’t get that memo: two weeks before “Nothing Living Lives Alone” opened, Providence College, a Catholic University operated by the Dominican Order in Rhode Island, canceled it, as if to say, “you may not live alone, but you sure as hell do not belong here.”