Solange’s Saint Heron Announces Next Phase as Cultural Institution

Saint Heron is proud to formally announce its next evolutionary phase as a cultural institution. It is expanding into a multidisciplinary platform, studio and creative agency with an urgent mission to preserve, collect and uplift the stories, works, and archives that amplify vital voices within communities. The company will build spaces that engage radical conversation and conceptual imagining across art, design, architecture, fashion and literature. Saint Heron is also slated to launch its dossier with literary and visual retrospectives of radical family and artist’ lineages via SaintHeron.com. Each piece will exist for the span of 7 to 10 days and provide an in-depth exploration of emerging talent and pioneering artists, sculptors, photographers, designers, and artisans. The first digital installation available here, shares the story of Saint Heron, as told by Solange Knowles, its Founder, Creative Director and Art Director.

Periodically, the Saint Heron Dossier will showcase literary exhibitions that tell inspirational stories of familial lineage, returning home, physical exodus and personal reclamation. In the coming days, Saint Heron will explore the career of American visual artist, sculptor, bestselling novelist, and award-winning poet Barbara Chase-Riboud in conversation with award-winning author and educator, Ilyasah Shabazz. Readers can also look forward to interviews with Shala Monroque and artist Cassi Namoda, a conversation between Helga Davis and Okwui Okpokwasili, and archives from Womack & Womack and Composer Charles Stepney.

Honoring the institution’s mission to reinforce the urgency of building archives, the digital dossier is the first of many exciting projects to come from Saint Heron. Supporters can expect a series of gallery exhibitions and installations, as well as an artist in residence programme, a permanent art and design collection, a non-profit library offering free access to Saint Heron’s archived collection, an in-house line of home and fashion collectibles, unique brand collaborations, special music projects via Saint Records, experimental art film releases and more in the near future.

Saint Heron will also be building out their Gallery, Small Matter. With Small Matter, Saint Heron will explore futurism design as a form of cultural expression, with every object being a present force that encompasses light, color, movement, shape, speed, scale, and process. These works range from large and small scale functional sculptures, architectural objects, furniture collection, lighting design, garments, and more. Many of these upcoming works will be designed by Solange herself, and some are designs from other collaborators like architect-designer Jerome Byron and Saint Heron’s own Product Development Consultant, Mark Grattan.

In addition to this, Saint Heron will continue its activism work with the Saint Heron Holism Project, an initiative built to bring holistic therapeutic healing and support to women, girls and communities of color.

Speaking about the creation of Saint Heron and this next phase, Solange said:

“Worldmaking has been a huge part of my practice. The idea of leaving behind cities, meccas, and universes that were occupied and celebrated by bodies, voices, celebrations and rituals to be discovered down the line. As we transition to an institution, the answer and the vision become abundantly clear. We are creating a legacy where we not only continue the work we have already built, but preserve collections of creators with the urgency they deserve. Together we want to create an archive of stories, and works we deem valuable. We want to open up these works publicly, and make them accessible to students, and our communities for research, engagement, and consumption so that the works are integrated into our collective story and belong and grow with us. We are creating an embodiment of living testaments to the glory of expression, and how that recharges and reaffirms the reverence we hold for our own cultural and artistic worth. We look forward to furthering the pursuit of authenticity that empowers the stories of our people.”

Saint Heron launched in 2013 as a call to community; creating a hub for music, arts and cultural conversations of their own. The company built a legacy through the creation of special projects such as the release of an eponymous musical compilation, visionary content from creative talent, and thoughtfully curated events and art experiences in collaboration with Hauser & Wirth, The Met, Parsons School of Art & Design, Nike, Google and Pitchfork.