Building New Worlds Exhibit

By Erin Lynn Williams, Jody Myrum, Kruthika N. S., and Laura V.

What would the world look like, feel like, be like if it supported the power, dreams and resistance of girls?

In March, at the GG and Pop Institute, Our Collective Practice launched Building New Worlds - an exhibit and a living testament to the power of girls and young feminists. Not just to survive, but as the audacious, joyful, and deeply political act of building life-affirming and just worlds. A collective offering. A bold call to action.

The exhibit is a collective labor of love that brings together the voices, visions, and lived experiences of girls and young feminists who refuse to be erased—Black girls, Dalit girls, Indigenous girls, refugee and migrant girls, queer girls, girls with disabilities—ALL girls. Girls of the past, present, and future. A living archival library that declares, unequivocally: to be a girl is to be powerful.

The exhibit launch brought community together surrounded by powerful artwork and captivating performances by Erin Lynn Williams, Kruthika NS, Laura Vergara, and Montserrat Turqueza. Three of these artists joined us in person—sharing, laughing, answering questions, and engaging in deep conversations about what it means to dream, resist, and build new worlds.

At the heart of it all were the girls around the world whose stories shaped the exhibit itself—girls who are not only dreaming of new futures, but actively mapping pathways for social and systemic change. Girls who are building a world where everyone belongs and feels safe —transforming systems, sparking movements, and imagining beyond what we've been told is possible.

Is that not a world we all want to live in?

Throughout the evening, we were reminded that every system currently upholding injustice and inequality was once imagined. It was once resourced. It was once built. And now—at a time when so many of these systems are crumbling—we have an extraordinary opportunity to imagine and build again.

What’s being offered is more than hope—it’s a declaration. A demand. A blueprint. And most importantly, it’s an invitation. Now, we must answer that invitation with action. The call is clear:

• Move beyond witnessing.

• Stand in solidarity.

• Shift power and resources.

Girls’ dreams and resistance must not only be recognized, but also centered in everything we do. Imagine the possibilities.

Featured Artists

Kruthika N. S.

“By revealing to us their dreams, these girls and young feminists have trusted us with the most precarious resource of our time—hope. We owe it to them to choose this hope against hopelessness. Their dreams over dystopias. And resistance over resignation.”

Kruthika / ಕೃತಿಕಾ is an interdisciplinary artist, storyteller, and lawyer from Bengaluru, India and works in Brooklyn, NY. As an Artist-in-Residence with Our Collective Practice, she is interested in the power of radical imagination in dreaming, realizing, and birthing new futures. She plays with content and form, and uses diverse mediums in her work, often blending media like illustration with puppetry, comics with pop-up books, and animatronics with film. Kruthika’s art is political yet playful—incorporating stories, oral histories, and games as an invitation to shared dialogue. She embraces collaboration with feminist organisers across the world, and you can reach her on Instagram: @TheWorkplaceDoodler.

Erin Lynn Williams

“It is essential to remember, embrace and heal our inner child as an act of resistance. Only with an embodied sense of liberation, joy and dreams can we collectively build a just new world.”

Erin is an Artist-in-Residence with Our Collective Practice and is working to transform a publication of over 150 “Stories of Girls’ Resistance” from 90 countries into a ‘plurilogue’ performance piece. Erin has been a leader in radical resource redistribution for 10 years and has developed successful funding programs to amplify social movements both domestically and internationally. Prior to philanthropy, she was an organizer, coalition builder and advisor across Canada, Belgium, Jamaica, and Botswana. 

Montserrat Turqueza

“To sow the seed that becomes plants and communicate history through our roots... As a woman artist, I consider it my duty to pave the way for the children who will walk the paths of resistance, so their struggle can be transformed into something more loving and gentle. For my daughters and the daughters of their daughters—because they deserve a sunset, fertile earth, for their rights to be upheld, and for their dreams to be seen. Creating, for me, is a way of embodying resistance."

Montserrat Turqueza was born in Oaxaca de Juárez, Oaxaca. She spent her childhood and part of her adolescence in the coastal region of Oaxaca, where she began exploring art and painting. Her work and style are deeply rooted in her surroundings, honoring the power of communities and the richness of their identities and cultures, while discovering the worldview and traditions of each community that makes up their and our cosmovisions.

LAURA VERGARA

“The older I grow, the more I reconnect to my younger self. The more I realize  how the systems sought to make us forget the power we hold. The power to weave our worlds with the very threads that connect us all, our dreams.”

Laura Vergara is a political organizer and dreamer from Colombia sparking collective action through art and storytelling. Her lived experience, along with her work within immigrant and refugee rights movements and broader social justice struggles, has deeply influenced her art and strengthened her unwavering belief that another reality is not just possible—it is already unfolding. She draws inspiration from social movements, collective care, art, and those who ground themselves in the political and material practice of solidarity, accountability, and love. 

Participant Reflections