Initiated by artist Marisa Morán Jahn (Studio REV-) with the National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA), the CareForce is an ongoing set of public art projects amplifying the voices of America’s fastest growing workforce — caregivers. The CareForce consists of two mobile studios (NannyVan, CareForce One), a Tribeca Film Institute-supported app for domestic workers that CNN named as “one of 5 apps to change the world,” performances and choreographies, printed works, and CareForce One Travelogues, a Sundance-supported film series for PBS/ITVS co-produced with Oscar and Emmy-winning filmmaker Yael Melamede.
About the film: A humorous and touching road tale, the CareForce One Travelogues features Marisa, her son Choco, and their buddy Anjum Asharia as they travel from their homes in NYC to Miami in a fifty-year old station wagon, the CareForce One. Meeting up with nannies, housekeepers, caregivers, and allies along the way, this series explores how care intersects with some of today's most pressing issues — immigration, the legacies of slavery, racial discrimination, and more.
On November 16, 2019, at the Visible Foundation, an international jury for socially engaged work assembling at Paris' L'Hotel de Ville, the CareForce announces a brand new iniative — the CarePod, a cooperative, urban-scale housing solution promoting collectivized home-ownership for caregivers and quality care for elders. Responding to the economic precarity of America’s domestic workers, the shortage of affordable quality care faced by elders, and the social isolation endemic to caregivers and care-providers alike, the CarePod is a cooperative, urban-scale housing solution promoting collectivized home-ownership for caregivers while fully embracing the reality that behind every individual who needs care is a superhero team, or “careforce.”
The CarePod builds on the work of Marisa, NDWA, and MIT Assistant Professor of Architecture and Urbanism Rafi Segal internationally recognized for his design of urban-scale cooperatives in the U.S., Rwanda, Israel, and Southeast Asia.
Excerpting from The Age of Dignity (The New Press, 2016) written by NDWA Founder Ai-jen Poo, “A CarePod consists of four two-bedroom apartments grouped around a garden; looking from a bird’s eye point of view this would form the shape of a plus. Care receivers live on the bottom floor and caregivers live on top. The caregiver pays an initial fee to join the coop and cares for those who live below. Over the course of fifteen years, the caregiver earns credits towards owning their own unit, and when they themselves need care, they will in turn receive care.” In addition to the CarePod’s physical footprint, Rafi, Marisa, and CareForce stakeholders will envision integrating scalable digital-to-urban features. Examples include a “CareBank,” (ways to provide care and bank the hours for use later), ways to manage and collect benefits, and a platform to ensure families and caregivers stay informed about a client’s care needs.
In Summer 2020, the CarePod will be workshopped at MIT along with a team of architects, engineers, artists, caregivers, care-receivers, Marisa, and CareForce teammates. Course leader Rafi Segal, who has taught a seminar on collectives at MIT since 2016, authored several books on the topic, and worked with communities on creating shared-use spaces, notes, “Today, architecture’s strongest potential is its ability to express and engender our common values.”
Marisa, Choco and Anjum set off for Miami in their 50-year old superhero-themed station wagon, the CareForce One, as part of a project exploring domestic worker justice, only to find themselves challenged by care and cars before they even leave.
Previous highlights include exhibitions/presentations at the Van Abbe Museum (Netherlands), Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Museum of Modern Art, Oakland Museum, keynotes at Open Engagement and University of Michigan Penny Stamps Lecture Series, interactive exhibitions at The White House State of Women 2016, National Nanny Training Day, Harvard University School of Public Health, MIT, and more.
Presentation about the CareForce and other interactive media.
Introduction by Sasha Costanza
Introduction by Sasha Costanza-Chock, Associate Professor, MIT CMS/W
Respondents: Jane M. Hussein Saks, President + Artistic Director, Project &
Steve Seidel, Director, Arts in Education Program, Harvard Graduate School of Education
Presentation about the CareForce and other interactive media
Refreshments and childcare provided!
State Hall: Room 106, Wayne State University
Track: Shaping Stories, Building Power
A Tweet Chat hosted by Caring Across Generations featuring a panel of experts to discuss the culture, economics, and architect of end-of-life care. Panelists include Aisha Adkins (Our Turn 2 Care), Katherine A. Bell (Barron's), Amy Goyer (AARP), Sarita Gupta (Caring Across Generations), Marisa Morán Jahn (MIT, CareForce), Harald Bryn-Lund Lima (Municipality of Sandnes, Norway), Jenna McDavid (Diverse Elders), Liz Mazurski (End Well).
Release of CareForce One Travelogues on Indie Lens Storycast, a YouTube series of short docuseries created by indie filmmakers that ITVS launched in partnership with PBS Digital Studios.
Hosted by MIT Comparative Media Studies/Writing
Co-Presented by MIT Open Doc Lab and MIT Dept of Art, Culture, Technology
Marisa Morán Jahn, Artist; Film Series Producer; Lecturer, MIT ACT, Founder, Studio REV-
Worker Leaders from Matahari Women Workers' Center
Sasha Constanza-Chock, Associate Professor, MIT Comparative Media Studies and Writing
Paul Osterman, Professor, MIT Sloan School of Management; Co-Director, MIT Sloan Institute for Work and Employment Research
Artist's talk by Marisa Morán Jahn + film screening.
Pamela Torno, Series Producer of Digital Initiatives at ITVS.
Marisa Morán Jahn, Artist, film series producer, UC Berkeley Alum
René de Guzman, Senior Curator of Art at the Oakland Museum of California; previous Director of Visual Arts at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts; UC Berkeley alum.
KEYNOTE:
Ai-jen Poo, MacArthur Genius; Director, National Domestic Workers Alliance; Co-founder, Caring Across Generations.
Sheila Leddy, Fledgling Fund
Marisa Morán Jahn, Artist; Film Series Producer; Lecturer, MIT Art Culture Technology, Founder, Studio REV-
Emily Spieler, Professor of Law, Northeastern University School of Law; expert in labor and employment law
Natalicia Tracy, PhD, Executive Director, Brazilian Worker Center; Lecturer in Sociology, Boston University
ART | FILM | MUSIC | LIVELY CONVERSATION
Following the 30 minute screening, join participating artists, scholars, advocates, and musicians:
Hrag Vartanian (Editor-in-Chief and Founder, Hyperallergic)
Roxanne Baker, death doula
Allison Julian (National Domestic Workers Alliance, We Dream In Black)
Ilana Berger (Hand in Hand: Domestic Employer Network)
PERFORMANCES & MUSIC
M Peach (Mariana Martin Capriles)
Dj Ripley (Larissa Kingston Mann)
Narbada Chetri (Adhikaar) will sing a revolutionary Nepali song
HOST COMMITTEE
Suzy DelValle, President, Creative Capital
Beka Economopoulos, Co-Founder, Not An Alternative & The Natural History Museum
Kendal Henry, Director, Percent for Art Program in the City of New York
Christiane Paul, Curator, The Whitney; Dir/Chief Curator, Sheila C. Johnson Design Center at The New School/Parsons
Betsy Richards, Director, Creative Strategies and Public Programs, Opportunity Agenda; Indigenous arts advocate
Cameron Russell, Model, Cultural Producer, Activist
Lina Srivastava, Creative Impact Strategist, Ciel
Tricia Wang, Tech Ethnographer; co-founder of Sudden Compass and Magpie Kingdom
Celebrate the world premiere of CareForce One Travelogues with a 30 minute screening followed by a program featuring artists, thinkers, advocates including Studio REV-'s Marisa Morán Jahn, June Barrett (National Domestic Workers Alliance), Marcia Olivo (Miami Worker Center), and Andrea Mercado (New Florida Majority).
CareForce silkscreens and related media in a group exhibition curated by Jennie Lamensdorf (Art-in-Buildings). Other artists include other artists include Michael Mandiberg, Debra Priestly, Jean Shin, Paul Anthony Smith, Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Elizabeth White, and others
The CareForce's Marisa Jahn presents the CareForce in conversation with Kwentong Bayan, a collective creating a comic book documenting the leadership and organizing work of Filipin@ / Filipinx caregivers, and moderator Marissa Largo (artist, curator, educator). Christine Shaw, Director/Curator of the Blackwood Gallery, University of Toronto Mississauga, will speak about Take Care, a series exhibitions, workshops, and publications on the crisis of care.
Check out CareForce artwork at The Museum of Capitalism, an institution dedicated to educating this generation and future generations about the ideology, history, and legacy of capitalism.
A presentation and conversation that explores the intersection between creativity, caregiving, feminism, immigration, socio-economic and racial justice.
An exhibition curated by Neysa Page-Lieberman and Mel Hilliard Potter about the feminist legacy and contributions to socially-engaged art. Other featured artists include Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Las Nietas de Nonó, Fem Appeal, and others.
Dance, children's activities, tips and takeways. Special Guest Appearance by domestic workers from the Miami Worker Center!
A group exhibition curated by Elvis Fuentes that explores the huge impact that the auto industry has had in the visual arts of Latin America and Europe, as well as the emergence of Miami as a city of highways and point of convergence for so many immigrant artists who have left an imprint since the Cold War to the present.
Prints, kits, and collectible cards included in a group exhibition curated by Yaelle Amir organized around the theme of invisible labor and global capital.
Prints, kits, and collectible cards included in a group exhibition curated by Yaelle Amir organized around the theme of invisible labor and global capital.
Apr 7-Aug 14, 2016 | Exhibition at Brooklyn Museum (NYC)
As part of the AgitProp! exhibition on view, visitors are invited to point their phone at the collectible cards and poster to access animated micro-videos bringing you voices from the frontlines of care.
The CareForce One joins an afternoon of public art in Boston's Roxbury neighborhood followed by a party with Matahari celebrating International Domestic Workers' Day.
June 18, 2016, 4-6 pm (NYC) | Intl' Domestic Worker Day Celebration at Barnard College
Team CareForce joins up with NYC-based domestic workers to facilitate a CareForce Disco
June 14, 2016, 8-6 pm | White House State of Women (Washington, D.C.)
A summit advancing the health, education, and socio-economic strength of women across America convened by the White House.
June 4th, 2016, 5-8 pm | Dance Workshop + Mobile Studio at Brooklyn Museum's Family Day (NYC)
From 5-6 pm, the public is invited to join a workshop accompanying the AgitProp! exhibition. A workshop co-choreographed with facilitators Marisa Morán Jahn, Rockafella, and Vero Ramirez, participants will pick up new bumpin’ dance moves (for any levels and any body types) while learning about the family and worker-led movement based on the principle of Fair Care=Quality Care. At 6 pm, we’ll share out these moves around the CareForce One, hear live stories by The Moth, and passersby can pick up FairCare toolkits.
April 29th, 2016, 5-9 pm (dance at 5:15-6 pm) | Dance Workshop + Mobile Studio at Open Engagement 2016: Power. The Oakland Museum (Bay Area, CA)
Join the CareForce One + live singing by domestic worker superhero Guillermina Castellanos to kick off this annual conference about socially engaged art.
Apr 7-Aug 14, 2016 | Workshop + Mobile Studio at National Nanny Training Day (Cambridge)
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Tang Center, 2 Amherst Street, Floor 3, Cambridge, MA 02139
Hosts: Hosts: Matahari and CareAcademy
Join the CareForce One and 250 nannies in co-choreographing a new dance about the growing movement for caregivers’ rights! Our workshop will take place at lunchtime but you can catch the car on view throughout the conference and take home a CareForce Legal Kit and superhero-themed collectible cards featuring stories from those at the frontlines of care.
mid-Apr, 2016 | Outreach + Mobile Studio (Boston)
Join the MA Coalition for Domestic Workers and Brazilian Worker Center for outreach to workers at pit stops throughout Boston’s libraries, parks, community centers, transit hubs, and public spaces.
March 30, 2016, 5-8 pm | Workshop + Mobile Studio Northeastern University's Center for the Arts (Boston)
“Designing a CareForce Toolkit for the Panini Generation”
Using drawing and movement, participants will brainstorm innovative tools to help bolster the FairCare movement and reach younger generations. This workshop is open to NEU students and is a component of Dr. Alessandra Renzi’s course, “The Border as Medium.”
March 29, 2016, 4:30-6 pm | Reception for CareForce One mobile studio
Northeastern Crossing (Boston)
1175 Tremont Street, Boston, MA 02120
Hosts: Northeastern University’s Social Impact Lab in partnership with Social Justice Resource Center, Northeastern Crossing, Northeastern Center for the Arts, and Center for Advancing Teaching and Learning through Research.
Join the CareForce's Marisa Morán Jahn and Natalicia Tracy (Exec Dir, Brazilian Worker Center) for a reception that caps off a day-long symposium (“Making a Difference in a Complex World: Reimagining the Social Change Toolkit”) of thought-provoking conversations and practical workshops on responding to complex humanitarian crises, mapping networks and systems, collaborative problem solving, the power of policy and public office to address systemic problems and more.
Feb 27, 2016 | Workshop at EFA Project Space, NYC
Workshop for an accompanying exhibition entitled Let Down Reflex. Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts (323 W. 39th St., 2nd Fl, NYC). Curated by Jacqueline Hoàng Nguyễn with sessions led by Maiko Tanaka, Christa Donner, and Marisa Morán Jahn, this workshop explores structural questions at the intersection of the art worker, care and social reproduction.
February 26, 2016 | Panel at Transcultural Exchange (Boston)
The Work of Art in the World: Civic Agency and Public Humanities. Marisa Morán Jahn joins author Harvard professor Doris Sommer and others in a panel about social engagement.
CareForce Matching Crowdfunding Campaign
Thank you for joining us in our crowdfunding campaign!
CareForce drawing workshops at Pay It Forward, a symposium at Fieldston Ethical Culture Society, The New School and New York University.
100 Miles 100 Women. The CareForce joins one hundred women on a 100-mile pilgrimage from a detention center in York County, Pennsylvania to Washington, DC. Set to arrive when the Pope will be speaking in Congress and meeting with the President, we will walk carrying stories from a site of human suffering to the Pope with a message of human dignity.
Domestic Worker Disco at the Allied Media Conference
Domestic Worker Disco Dance Practice to honor International Domestic Workers Day
Exhibition at Franklin Street Works: Acting on Dreams Exhibition curated by Yaelle Amir. Other artists: Andrea Bowers, CultureStrike & JustSeeds, Chitra Ganesh and Mariam Ghani, Ghana ThinkTank, Jenny Polak, Favianna Rodriguez, and QUEEROCRACY in collaboration with Carlos Motta.
In the 1930s and 40s, Southern lawmakers intentionally excluded domestic workers — who were then largely African American — from receiving the same basic rights (minimum wage, overtime wage, workers compensation) as other workers. While some rights for domestic workers have improved, most of the laws for the nation’s 2 million domestic workers have not.
The massive entry of women into the labor force over the past several decades has not been met with generous public policies related to maternity leave, family leave, child care, or elder care. This leaves many relying on professionally-paid domestic workers who themselves are often balancing their own families needs at an average median income of $13,000 a year.
As BabyBoomers retire, America needs to double the number of existing caretakers by 2020 to meet our nation’s basic daily needs. Current policies haven’t taken into account this unprecedented growth. We need real leadership and new systems to ensure this “elderboom” doesn’t fall onto the shoulders of younger generations and that we can age with dignity.
"Caring is a team sport that seeks to win the care system we collectively need — and creativity is key to achieving this goal."
Artist Marisa Morán Jahn is part of the ‘Sandwich (or Panini) Generation’ who feels squeezed between the caregiving needs of both generations. “Caregivers play an essential role in teaching my toddler new skills, ensuring my grandmother stays healthy, and allowing me to go to work. The well-being of my family relies on these amazing women and I want to make sure they are in turn well-cared for. We together form a critically interdependent CareForce that inspires me.”
In 2012, Jahn and her teammates created the Domestic Worker App (accessible by even the most basic flip phone) — think Click and Clack on NPR’s Car Talk but for nannies — which CNN included on its list of “5 apps that can change the world.” Next came the NannyVan, a bright orange mobile design studio and sound lab that accelerates the movement for domestic workers rights. In 2014, the NannyVan drove over 3500 miles, reached 10,000 individuals, and millions more through international media. Gleaning and sharing tips along the way, the team created a suite of other tools for domestic workers like a sample bilingual contract, know-your-rights tools (see below), and more.
After her grandmother spent the twighlight of her life in her home with a thoughtful caregiver, Jahn increased focus on ways to involve domestic employers in the movement for quality, dignified care. Carrying forward the previous projects' self-same superhero zeal and framed as the "CareForce," Jahn and team began creating art, animations, and interactive media for cultural venues visited by those who employ caregivers. Emmy and Oscar-winning filmmaker Yael Melamede (SALTY Features) joined the team as a Producer to produce the film series, CareForce One Travelogues, to share the story to an even broader audience.
Creative Time Reports: NannyVan
7.5 minutes
CareForce Disco at LA City Hall
CA Domestic Worker Coalition, 2016
Augmented Reality
30 sec video demo
CareForce Collectible Cards
Pocket Stories + Micro-animations
Pre-tax Care Allowances
WPA-era inspired silkscreen
Grow the Movement
WPA-era inspired silkscreen
Support America's Elderboom
WPA-era inspired silkscreen
Caregiver Credits
WPA-era inspired silkscreen
Exhibitions
Prints + Interactive Media
Know Your Rights Bus Cards
MA, NY, CA, IL
NannyVan A-Go-Go
Creative Media Jumpkit
Domestic Worker App Trailer
2.5 minutes
FAIR CARE COLORING PLACEMAT
Trickle up Tips for families!
CREATIVE STORYTELLING
Philippino Worker Center, L.A.
Domestic Worker Doo-Wop
Brazilian Worker Ctr, Boston
DRAWING, ACTING, DANCING
CA Domestic Worker Coalition
We create art and tools that impact the lives of domestic workers, families, and all those involved in caregiving. Our secret mojo: sound research, creativity, and playfulness to make policy fun and juicy.
An artist of Ecuadorian and Chinese descent, Marisa Morán Jahn founded Studio REV-, a non-profit organization whose public art and creative media with low-wage workers, immigrants, and teens has been reviewed in The New York Times, Art Forum, BBC; showcased at The White House, Museum of Modern Art, PBS; and awarded grants from Creative Capital, Tribeca Film Institute, Sundance, NEA, and Anonymous Was a Woman which recognizes mid-career artists who have achieved significant accomplishments. For two decades she has taught k-12 youth. She has taught at The New School, Teachers College at Columbia University, and MIT's Program in Art, Culture, and Technology, her alma mater.
Yael Melamede is the co-founder of SALTY Features, an independent production company based in NYC whose goal is to create media that is provocative, vital, and enhances the world. Her recent works include "(DIS)HONESTY: The Truth About Lies” (with Dan Ariely); INOCENTE (Oscar, Best Doc Short); WHEN I WALK (directed/written by Jason Da Silva and Alice Cook); BRIEF INTERVIEWS WITH HIDEOUS MEN (written/directed by John Krasinski and based on the book by David Foster Wallace); THE INNER LIFE OF MARTIN FROST (written/directed by Paul Auster); and MY ARCHITECT (directed by Nathaniel Kahn and nominated for an Academy Award in 2004. She is currently working on a project exploring hate with Steven Spielberg.
You may have seen Ai-jen Poo with Meryl Streep at the 2018 Golden Globes, supporting the #TimesUp initiative to combat sexual harassment and inequality. Ai-jen Poo, MacArthur “Genius” and one of Fortune’s "50 World’s Greatest Leaders," founded National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA), the nation’s leading voice for dignity and fairness for the millions of domestic workers in the United States. Poo also co-founded Caring Across Generations which transforms the way we care in this country through culture change work; local, state and federal policy advocacy; online campaigning; and field activities and civic engagement.
Co-Pilot and Co-Producer: Anjum Asharia
Director & Director of Photography, Main Editor: Marc Shavitz
Editors: Saleem Reshamwala, Lizzie Minges (trailer)
Film crew: Elana Meyers, Nick Capezzera, Mark Stetson
Taehee Whang
Noelia Dominguez
Anya Krawcheck
Eric Siegel
National Employment Law Project
Urban Justice Center
Brazilian Immigrant Center
NuLawLab, Northeastern Univ. School of Law
Mujeres Unidas y Activas
Pilipino Worker Center
Adhikaar for Human Rights
Hand in Hand: Domestic Employer Association
Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA)
Domestic Workers United
Instituto de Educación Popular del Sur de California (IDEPSCA)
Affiliated and unaffiliated domestic worker groups across the nation.
