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Amanda Thackray

@mandattacks

3K

followers

2014

following

2025-26 EPA Lower Passaic River AIR
Artist and educator
SUNY Purchase + Rutgers
Bodies of rope. Ever-shifting waters.
Newark, NJ

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Zines are up at the park!!! by @mandattacks

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4 months ago

I am pleased to announce that I have been selected as the inaugural EPA Artist in Residence for the Lower Passaic River. This program is in partnership with the Lower Passaic River Urban Waters Federal Partnership, New York-New Jersey Harbor & Estuary Program, Newark Arts and Newark City Parks Foundation as Project Partners; the Hudson River Foundation as Administrator; and the US Environmental Protection Agency.

This summer I will host community programming along the Lower Passaic, between Paterson and Newark, in pursuit of the creation of a large-scale public artwork. If you are interested in the Passaic, I’d love for you to be a part of my project. Stay tuned for more soon!!

📸: @williamaortega Lower Passaic waterfront 2024 taken in Newark, New Jersey by @mandattacks

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a year ago

My second round of on-site papermaking happened at Oxfordhalvøya. There were sculptural growlers (baby icebergs) in the shoreline behind me. The landscape felt like another planet. I didn’t explore much because I had a quota (lol) to fill. Now, after seeing shipmates’ photos of the landing, I am a bit regretful that I did not plan more time to explore. Still, it was a very full day.

Swipe for documentation of other papermaking and some other fun stuff from that day (including an outtake from @katinthehats project)

The sun dipped lower every night, and this night it glowed so intensely it looks as if the horizon was on fire. by @mandattacks

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2 years ago

I am so honored to have my work included in four shows during the Newark Art Festival this weekend. I have new work on view at @indexartcenter (a collab with @mark_thespark opening Friday!) and through @tinygalleryorg outdoors on Treat Place. I am showing a new version of my Meadow installation at the NAF exhibition at @expressnewark curated by the amazing @adrienneewheeler (with big thanks to the expert install team!), and lastly some of my cast glass books in a really good group show at @glassrootsinc new gallery on Halsey Street!

This weekend has already felt so full and it’s barely started! taken in Newark, New Jersey by @mandattacks

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4 days ago

COMING THIS FALL!
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"The Islands Have Stories" is a series of four walks through Newark's Meadows, guided by 4 artists exploring 4 ways of sensing place.

On each walk, an artist guides participants in making works on paper, gathered afterward into a limited run of riso-printed publications and shared back with participants and the City of Newark.

WALK 1:
Oct 24 / Chrystofer Davis / Framing Edges

WALK 2:
Oct 25 / Larissa Belcic / Foraging Tools

WALK 3:
Oct 31 / Andrew Harrison / Making Inks

WALK 4:
Nov 1 / Amanda Thackray / Rubbing Place

RISO BOOK LAUNCH:
April 21, 2027 / Under the Pink Moon

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"The Islands Have Stories" is free and open to the public, though RSVPs are required. Space is limited!

LINK IN BIO TO TO SECURE YOUR SPOT.

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This program marks the launch of Newark Dept of Care & Belonging, a speculative civic agency built on a simple premise that place – and all the life forms living with it – are bound in care for one another, and that this belonging should guide how civic decisions get made.

Newark Dept of Care & Belonging is partially supported by a Creative Catalyst grant from the City of Newark, Division of Arts and Cultural Affairs, and a Newark Artist Accelerator grant from Project for Empty Space and the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

@dolo_foto
@larissabelcic
@black_el_dorado
@mandattacks

@projectforemptyspace
@cityofnewarknj

#placebased
#newarkmeadows
#ironbound
#publishingasactivism
#newarkdeptofcareandbelonging taken in Newark, New Jersey by @mandattacks

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14 days ago

➡️ Join PES Studios on Sunday, October 11, from 1–5 PM at📍800 Mayor Kenneth A. Gibson Blvd., Newark, NJ, for our annual FALL OPEN STUDIOS! Explore four floors of 50+ artist studios and community workshop spaces while enjoying a warm brunch and breakfast cocktails. RSVP via 🔗 link in bio!

Visit the studio of Amanda Thackray! @mandattacks | Studio 310 ✨

Amanda Thackray is a community-engaged multidisciplinary ecofeminist artist-educator based in Newark, NJ. Her work pulls on the tenuous threads between nature, industry, and human experience, evoking strong themes of speculative fiction, labor, and the entwinement of human bodies with nonhuman kin. Thackray’s work is known for its meticulous detail and layered compositions that draw inspiration from organic forms and industrial structures, creating art that evokes both beauty and a sense of unease.

She is the recipient of multiple Creative Catalyst Fellowships, a Puffin Foundation Grant for Environmental Art, and a NJ State Council Artist Fellowship. She has held residences through The Arctic Circle, Svalbard; Center for Book Arts, NYC; and Museum of Art and Design, NYC, among others. Thackray earned a BFA from Mason Gross at Rutgers University and an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). She is currently the inaugural EPA Lower Passaic River Artist-in-Residence.

Learn more about the artist at 📲 ajthackray.com/ or in person on Oct. 11th!

🌟 PES STUDIOS, part of Project for Empty Space, is a nonprofit arts initiative creating safe and equitable spaces for social dialogue. We support socially engaged artists by amplifying narratives often erased, while holding space for reflection and imagining new futures.

This event is held in conjunction with the Newark Arts Festival (@NewarkArts).

📸 Carlos Hernandez (@carloshernandezstudios) by @mandattacks

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25 days ago

In 2020, I made Red Harbinger. Deep in the pandemic, I was in the studio alone and recorded this video as documentation of my process.

Red Harbinger evokes an amalgamation of references - of lost fishing net, of plastic bag, of squid, of school of fish, or other deep sea life - but it also bears the witness marks of slow, deliberate wearing against my human form.

It felt silly to do this, and it still feels a bit silly, but it wore the paper net in a soft and layered way, with a feeling of deep time. taken in Gallery Aferro by @mandattacks

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a month ago

A small section of Riparian Chorus on a gorgeous windy day at Riverfront Park. taken in Passaic River by @mandattacks

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2 months ago

I bought this necklace in while travelling in Sardinia with @darlenespressa last summer. The largest amulet is called Su Coccu and is meant to ward off evil. It is surrounded by a hand twisted silver filigree cone (my favorite part!). This necklace speaks when I move.. a light jingling when the elements shift. I wore it today to bring luck during an important meeting. 🤞 by @mandattacks

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2 months ago

Some outtakes from photographing Riparian Chorus flags in the studio with @kevintfrances back in May. by @mandattacks

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2 months ago

When I talk about my project Riparian Chorus, I have often described the flags as being like pages of a book -- when strung together, they create a sentence or a narrative.

As the flags on the waterfront fade and wear in the summer sun and the wind and the rain and the brackish water misting off the Passaic, I share with you now, a statement of hope for the Passaic. If you have the companion zine (still available for free at Riverfront Park!) you can use the contents of the zine to help decode the meaning of the flags. But maybe you don't need it? Maybe hope is universal?

📸: @kevintfrances taken in Newark Riverfront Park by @mandattacks

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2 months ago

We celebrated the installation of Riparian Chorus flags and the release of the zine edition on a beautiful Saturday morning in June. Gathering on this day was an acknowledgment of over a year of community organizing, studio labor, all the wonderful support, and the amazing✨ women ✨ who helped make the project a reality.

Endless thanks to Liz Balladares and HEP, Marcy DePina and Newark Parks, Adrienne Wheeler and Newark Arts, my collaborator Steph Jordan, my studio and workshop assistant Marielle, and Rachel Fawn for documenting the day. taken in Passaic River by @mandattacks

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2 months ago