Hope Factory: A Place to Practice Respair | Brought to you by the Public Works Division of LoveYou2.org

Hope Factory was hosted July 26-28, 2024 at Four Chicken Gallery in Bernal Heights, San Francisco. Hope Factory is the second offering of the Public Works Division of LoveYou2.org. You can peep photos and videos from Hope Factory in a stories highlight on my Instagram page.

Hope Factory was presented as a Work in Progress interactive public art installation aiming to create a space for individuals to explore and nurture hope collectively. Hope Factory was conceived on the beliefs that:

• Hope is a skill.

• We can respair together.

• Community is a powerful antidote to disconnect and despair. 

Image curtesy of @eyeofTed features the front window at Hope Factory.

Hope Factory featured three core activities:

✅ Walls of Respair

✅ Note to Future Self

✅ Hope Zine making

During Hope Factory, we respaired together - we pinned our despairs on one wall and what sparked hope on another wall. Then, using string pulled between despair and hope, we mapped the actions we took to move between these realities. We made Hope Zines, where participants could take their newfound hope skills out on hope field trips and look for hope alerts.

A capture of some of the submissions for the Walls of Respair.

It was an incredible experience to be in community talking about our despairs and our hope — and how we might build our hope skills. This is the work we can do together as we create a more equitable world.

I am so grateful to Four Chicken Gallery and the Hope Factory participants for this incredible experience to be in and learning with community together.

Here is a gallery of some of the many photos from Hope Factory.