Leslie-Lohman Museum Hosts Pamela Sneed and Carlos Martiel's 'Sacred and Profane' Performance Exhibition

Pamela Sneed and Carlos Martiel presented their joint exhibition 'Sacred and Profane' at the Leslie-Lohman Museum in SoHo, New York. Sneed, a poet and painter, performed a reading about meeting friends in urgent care, while Martiel staged a piece titled 'No Resurrection' where he lay covered in earth with his mother seated atop the mound. The performance explored themes of Black maternal grief and collective mourning. The Leslie-Lohman Museum, described as the first institution of its kind globally, has become a sanctuary for LGBTQ+ and BIPOC artists facing political attacks. The exhibition connects to a residency on Fire Island where Sneed investigated the island's history in the slave trade. Earlier in the same space, Joshua Obawole performed 'Waves' as part of Athi-Patra Ruga's exhibition 'Lord, I Gotta Keep on Moving', curated by Stamatina Gregory. The museum's programming aims to support a dispersed community of artists across New York's five boroughs, fostering intergenerational and transnational collaborations. The performances reflect broader artistic practices that transform grief into ritual and community joy, as theorized by Christina Sharpe in her 2016 work 'In the Wake'. The article references José Esteban Muñoz's writings on disidentification and collective joy. The event was documented with photographs dated 2026.