From October 8–12, 2025, Newark Arts Festival will transform the city into a living canvas of art, music, and culture. This year’s theme, JOY, celebrates its power as a bold and transformative force—one that uplifts, empowers, and connects us all.
JOY is not frivolous. It is strength, harmony, and revolutionary change. This October, the festival invites us to embrace JOY in its fullest sense, through exhibitions, live performances, thought-provoking talks, family-friendly programming, and more.
I’m honored to be showing work in two venues this year:
Newark Museum of Art
49 Washington St, Newark, NJ
Works on view: Classic LBD & Boa Quill (2 of 5)
These works address the insidious weight of microaggressions, those subtle, often unconscious insults that people of color experience in everyday life.
- Have you been followed by security while shopping?
- Asked to prove you “belong” in your own home or garage?
- Mistaken for “the help” in a store or restaurant?
- Or expected to represent “all Black Americans” when the only person of color in a room?
These furtive slights accumulate into stress, anger, frustration, and invisibility. Classic LBD recasts the timeless “little black dress” as armor against microaggressions, while Boa Quill expands this conversation, transforming stereotype and bias into a statement of resistance and resilience.
Theda Sandiford
100′ of slip half hitched chain black glitter 1/4” cotton rope, knotted with ribbon, recycled sari ribbon, acrylic yarn, pearls and 8” zip ties on bamboo ring.
60 x 14 x 4 in
2021
Theda Sandiford
Recycled fishing net, ribbon, paracord and handmade jewelry on dressform
46 x 20 x 6 in
2020
Express Newark
54 Halsey St, Newark, NJ
Work on view: Power Puff with Black Racing Stripe Emotional Baggage Cart
This piece transforms a reclaimed shopping cart, wrapped in woven New York Post newspaper sleeves, into a vessel of joyful resistance. BAD NEWS becomes reimagined as beauty, hope, and empowerment, an act of flipping the narrative.
Joyful resistance is about reclaiming space, finding connection, and celebrating resilience in the face of adversity. It is about holding onto vision and possibility, even when challenged by oppressive forces. By weaving the mundane into the extraordinary, this cart becomes both a shield and a beacon, carrying stories of survival and transformation.
Come Celebrate JOY
Newark Arts Festival 2025 is an invitation to see Newark in full, vibrant color. Whether you are deeply rooted in the arts or simply curious, come celebrate JOY as the heartbeat of the community.
📅 October 8–12, 2025
📍 Newark Museum of Art & Express Newark
What’s your JOY?