Project for Empty Space at 800 Broad Street is our Flagship Newark space. It’s home to our administrative offices, PES STUDIOS, our Artist In Residence Program, and our 4,000-square-foot gallery, which opened in 2024. The gallery hosts four exhibitions each year, along with various public programs.
In the coming year, the ground floor will have a dedicated education and community space that hosts exhibition-inspired intergenerational programs (serving ages 3 - 100+) and a gathering area for other community organizations.
Formerly a technical school, this PES building was ideally suited for private artist studios. Creative practitioners occupy studios ranging from 200 to 500 square feet. On the Ground Floor, the PES administrative offices manage many Newark-based programs, including professional development, artist project grants, and public art initiatives.
800 Broad has served many purposes over the past century. In the 1930s, it was the City Investment Building and home to the Newsreel Theatre on the ground floor. Remnants of its history, like its projector and the original hardwood floors, can still be found in the galleries. The rich history of this building permeates through its walls, and we are honored to be a part of the ongoing story.
UPCOMING:
HELINA METAFERIA’S WHEN CIVILIZATIONS HEAL
Project for Empty Space is delighted to present When Civilizations Heal, a solo exhibition by Helina Metaferia the PES 800 Broad Street location from May 6, 2025, through August 17, 2025. A reception will be held on Saturday, May 17th, from 5 to 7 pm.
When Civilizations Heal is an interdisciplinary project that imagines the exhibition space as an anthropological site, creating artifacts as art objects, assembled from archives of the last sixty years of activism, with an emphasis on the role that women-identifying people of color have played. Working across a diverse range of mediums, the artist brings together collage, sculpture, printmaking, video performances, and installation as methods for visually articulating the power of organizing as a political, communal, and artistic act. The exhibition also features a work-in-progress preview of a new short documentary film adaptation based on Metaferia’s practice. Throughout the exhibition, various community programs and local archival research will contribute to a multi-site public artwork that will be revealed at the end of the exhibition, in partnership with the City of Newark’s Division of Arts and Cultural Affairs.
Helina Metaferia comments “It’s been a joy to work with Project for Empty Space (PES) powerhouse founders Jasmine Wahi and Rebecca Jampol, and the whole PES team, to develop this project. I feel fortunate to have my work situated in an artistic community whose values and mission are aligned with those of my art practice, which centers socially impactful work in service of justice and equity.”
Visitors can view the exhibit at Project for Empty Space at 800 Broad Street Newark, NJ 07102.
About Helina Metaferia
Helina Metaferia is an interdisciplinary artist working across collage, sculpture, video, performance, and social engagement. Her work incorporates archival research, embodied practices, and dialogical studies, supporting overlooked narratives of intersectional identities.
Metaferia’s solo exhibitions include Museum of African Diaspora, San Francisco, CA (2024-2025); RISD Art Museum, Providence, RI (2022-2023); and Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA (2021-2022). Her work was included in the 2023 Sharjah Biennial, United Arab Emirates. Group exhibitions include Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France (2025); Blaffer Museum of Art, Houston, TX (2024); Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN (2023); The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, MD (2023); and Modern Art Museum Gebre Kristos Desta Art Center, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (2019). Her work is in institutional collections including Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA; Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, OH; Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL; and Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York, NY.
Metaferia received her MFA from Tufts University’s School of the Museum of Fine Arts and attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. She’s held residencies at MacDowell, Yaddo, Bemis Center for Contemporary Art, Recess Art, Project for Empty Space, and Silver Art Residency. Her work has been written about in The New York Times, Financial Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, Studio Museum in Harlem Magazine, Artnet, Artforum, and ArtNews. Metaferia is an Assistant Professor at Brown University in the Department of Visual Art, and lives and works in New York City.