La Lavanderia, Art as Cultural Laundry

Wandering through the streets of Suchitoto, El Salvador in 2009, photographer Michael Sibilia unknowingly started a project that would tie cultures together in the Hudson Valley region.

“I learned the community with a camera, I explored with it and figured out the things going on,” said Sibilia, a professional photographer who lives in Hopewell Junction. His explorations in Suchitoto led to meaningful relationships with people who spoke a language that he did not even understand and produced beautiful photos that reflect life in the village.

Today, his photographs from his time in the small Central American village hang in the H-Art galley at 1 South Division Street in Peekskill as the foundation for La Lavanderia. Dozens more photos of smiling families, beautiful landscapes and everyday items are hung on a clothes line amongst Sibilia's photos. They represent "slice of life" shots of everyday life and reflect a foreigner’s perspective of community in a new place.

La Lavanderia means laundry in Spanish. The name evolved as the show was created to display an artistic “explosion of community understanding, appreciation and discovery,” as the curator describes it.

"The laundromat is where people hang out and talk about the community," Sibilia said. Explaining that laundry is a more intimate part of a community, Sibilia said, "and any photo is a way of looking into the souls of things."

Several photographs of four other photographers are featured in the exhibit-two natives of La Cienega, Mexico, who now live in Poughkeepsie; one American in Costa Rica and another American in Peekskill. A young photographer from Peekskill, Sarah Hart, joined the exhibit for its H-Art gallery showing. Her photos reflect life in New York.

“We found photographers from north and south of the border,” Sibilia explained. “It is two people (himself and Sasha Bush) from the north looking at life in the south and two people from the south (Fel Santos and Roberto Cruz) looking at life in the north.”

The project was a mentor program where Sibilia taught the aspiring photographers who hold day jobs in construction and factory work about the technical aspects of the art. He gave them an assignment to take a photo of someone they did not know, and from that assignment La Lavanderia was created. The project has given the amateur artists exposure they would have otherwise never experienced as beginning photographers.

The exhibit was first shown last spring at the Mid-Hudson Heritage Center in Poughkeepsie, a center created by Roy Budnik, dedicated to celebrating the cultural diversity of the Hudson Valley. The Center opened about a year ago. Because La Lavanderia was created for the Heritage Center, Sibilia followed Budnik’s guidance to create it with Martin Luther King Jr.’s steps of nonviolence in mind.

The photographs and message of the show caught curator Wilfredo Morel's attention. Morel, of Peekskill’s H-Art gallery, is focused on presenting cultural exhibits that further the understanding of other community and culture.

Morel saw La Lavanderia in the Poughkeepsie and knew it would fit well in his Peekskill gallery.

“We look for things that reflect community,” Morel said. He and filmmaker Nick Cannell curated the show, which was organized by Steel Imaginations.

The exhibit opened in early December and will be on display through January and will have a closing party during Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday week to “include his profound messages of community and righteousness,” a press release states. Proceeds from the show will benefit Hudson River HealthCare. Smaller copies of the photographs are available for about $30 and large photographs are being sold for about $200.

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