> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://hyperallergic.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # An Open Letter to the Pit Gallery About Its “Glendale Biennial” and the Communities It Erases - URL: https://hyperallergic.com/open-letter-to-pit-gallery-glendale-biennial/ - Published: 2018-06-04T22:54:01.000Z - Updated: 2025-11-24T15:55:24.000Z - Description: More than 50 members of the Glendale art community and their supporters are calling for a boycott of the Pit. - Author: Mashinka Firunts - Tags: Opinion, Brand Library & Art Center, Glendale, The Pit, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-18 14:37 (2018) ![(image courtesy the letter signatories)](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2018/06/vision-valley-pit-gallery-glendale.jpg) (image courtesy the letter signatories) *This is an open letter to the Pit, a commercial artist-run gallery based in Glendale, California and opened in 2014\. This letter — a response to the exhibition* Vision Valley *(originally titled “Vision Valley: The Glendale Biennial”) curated by the Pit and on view at the* [*Brand Library Art Galleries*](https://www.glendaleca.gov/government/departments/library-arts-culture/brand-library-art-center/brand-library-art-galleries?ref=hyperallergic.com) *— has been circulating for one day among cultural workers in Glendale and neighboring communities, and among their allies near and far. The issues surrounding the exhibition were recently addressed in* [*an essay published by the Los Angeles Review of Books*](https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/valley-view-armenian-diasporic-account-lieu-glendale-biennial-review/?ref=hyperallergic.com)*. (The letter will be updated as new signatories are added. You can* [*view the original letter online*](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hZ3G-tJLcx16734z%5FODOcY3ywILhOS98vzArPesaoTg/edit?ref=hyperallergic.com)*.)* **\* \* \*** An Open Letter to the Pit Gallery (Adam D. Miller and Devon Oder): From the Immigrant and Armenian Diasporic Communities of Glendale, and Their Allies We are writing to tell you about the city of Glendale, California where you opened in 2014. We are writing to tell you about the immigrant communities whose erasure you are enacting. We request an immediate response. **We are calling for a boycott of the Pit Gallery.** We have asked you, *whose culture has capital*? Your silence declares that ours does not. By dismissing our queries and blocking us on social media, you tell us that our outcry against our own invisibility does not warrant a response. By refusing to address our concerns, you entrench the position that we are not legible as cultural producers, cultural stakeholders, or participants in our city’s cultural sphere. We are writing to remind you that your exhibition, *Vision Valley: The Glendale Biennial,* is hosted at a publicly funded municipal venue in Glendale, the Brand Art Center. You describe the exhibition as “a celebration of artists working in a specific community.” We are writing to remind you that the show is staged in a 40 percent Armenian neighborhood, the largest diasporic population of Armenians in the US. Among its roster of 32 predominately white artists, zero are Armenian. While your exhibition includes no Armenian artists, it does include all three directors of the Pit, as well as its gallery associate. We are writing to tell you that you launched your gallery amid a wave of economic violence in Glendale and across Los Angeles, resulting in the formation of the [Glendale Tenants Union](http://www.glendaletenants.org/?ref=hyperallergic.com) in 2017 and the coalitions [Defend Boyle Heights](http://defendboyleheights.blogspot.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com) and [Chinatown Community for Equitable Development](http://www.ccedla.org/?ref=hyperallergic.com). The latter two have called for city-wide boycotts of or actions against gentrifying agents. We are writing to tell you that we are prepared to defend our communities from erasure and displacement. We are writing to tell you that by excluding Glendale’s Armenian, Filipinx, Korean, and Latinx population in favor of a majority white roster, you are performing what Aruna D’Souza calls whitewalling and its racialized exclusions. This is not our first attempt to inform you. Community members voiced concerns about your exhibition. You declined to revise the curatorial framework or issue a public response. The City of Glendale asked that you change the title of the exhibition. You removed “Glendale Biennial” quietly from the exhibition materials without public acknowledgment or apology. You continue to use “#theglendalebiennial” on your social media, claiming an inalienable right to take ownership of this city. An Armenian cultural worker asked about your continued use of the title. You blocked her from your account. On May 27th, [an essay was published in the Los Angeles Review of Books](https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/valley-view-armenian-diasporic-account-lieu-glendale-biennial-review/?ref=hyperallergic.com) detailing your erasure of Glendale’s immigrant communities. You have not responded. The essay was widely circulated among your networks and appeared in various media outlets. You were tagged. Still, you have not responded. In lieu of a reply, you posted an image to your Instagram account on June 1st: ![This post was removed by the Pit on June 4, hours before the intended publication of this letter. (screenshot via Instagram)](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2018/06/pit-gallery-instagram.jpg) This post was removed by the Pit on June 4, hours before the intended publication of this letter. (screenshot via Instagram) It appears to feature the Japanese superhero “Ultraman” (invoked here as your avatar), who protects the earth from siege by a monstrous nonhuman menace—presumably, us. You have emblazoned the words “WE CAN’T BE STOPPED!” above the image in all caps, with the Pit logo below. The image articulates a symbolic threat against immigrant communities who would critique your actions. It drolly positions Glendale’s immigrant communities as nonhuman. You are planning to turn this image into a t-shirt that will be given away to gallery attendees. If it is your belief that your neocolonialist civilizing mission “can’t be stopped,” and that your exhibition’s vision of whitewashed futurity in Glendale is an inexorable reality; we are writing to tell you that you are mistaken. We are defined by a radical refusal to disappear. We call for an immediate public response. We call for a boycott of the Pit Gallery. **The following individuals and organizations in Glendale, and their allies near and far, call for a boycott of the Pit Gallery and urge the Pit to issue an immediate public response.** Mashinka Firunts Hakopian, Artist/Scholar, UCLA Meldia Yesayan, Cultural Worker Gilda Davidian, Independent Artist Anahid Yahjian, Independent Filmmaker Aram Saroyan, Poet/Artist Jacob Halajian, Filmmaker Nora Kayserian, Educator Grey James, Independent Artist Raffi Wartanian, Columbia University Nancy Agabian, Author/Professor, New York University Shahé Mankerian, Principal of St. Gregory Hovsepian School/Poet Arminé Iknadossian, Artist/Poet Johaina Crisostomo, UC Berkeley Carina Karapetian Giorgi, Professor of Sociology Suzy Halajian, Independent Curator Ara Madzounian, Filmmaker/Photographer Thea Farhadian, Independent Musician/Composer/Educator Daniel Scott Snelson, Assistant Professor, UCLA Virginia Arce, Independent Curator Kamee Abrahamian, Independent Artist Sona Tatoyan, Actor/Writer Linda Ganjian, Independent Artist Vahe Berberian, Artist/Writer Kareem Estefan, Art Critic/Scholar Katy Robinson, Mountain House Stefani Greenwood, Designer Audrey Chan, Independent Artist Kristy Lovich, Culture-Domestic Worker, Mountain House Hasmik Geghamyan, Educator/Lawyer Carol Zou, Cultural Worker Dawn Finley, Independent Scholar/Caregiver Maryam Hosseinzadeh, Cultural Worker Erich Wise, Artist Fiona Yun-Jui Chang, Independent Artist Eileen Ybarra, Librarian/Meditation Instructor Joanne Nucho, Anthropologist/Filmmaker, Pomona College Dina Dean, Independent Artist Ani Zakarian, Independent Artist Robert Nazar Arjoyan, Garuna Film Group Dennis R. Greenwood, Educator Anna Nersesyan, Independent Filmmaker Michael Thurin, Independent Artist Lousine Shamamian, Gay and Lesbian Armenian Society Board Member, Performer, and Filmmaker Victoria Martin, Pasadena City College Photography Professor – Retired Woody O’Toole, Independent artist/JJU Collective Molly Tierney, Independent Artist /JJU Collective Nicole Darling, Artist/Poet/Filmmaker/Writer/Critic Jennifer Witte, Bookseller Sarah Williams, Women’s Center for Creative Work Iggy Cortez, Scholar Ani Khodaverdian, Independent Entertainment Industry Attorney Bogdan Bagdasarov, Independent Artist lee williams boudakian, Independent Artist Jake Harkey, Stylist Ali Leeds, Independent Artist Amitis Motevalli, Artist Mahyar Nili, Artist, Psychotherapist Armineh Hovanesian, Independent Photographer Young-Tseng Wong, Independent Artist Arshia Haq, Artist Victoria Aleksanyan, Independent Filmmaker Von Curtis, Artist/Poet/Filmmaker/Scholar Johanna Cypis, Independent Artist Jennifer Wilson, Assistant Professor Anuradha Vikram, 18th Street Art Center Alex Lewin, Independent Artist Morgan Lariah, Filmmaker Hayk Makhmuryan, Cultural Worker Dahlia Elsayed, Artist/Associate Professor CUNY Roksana Filipowska, Scholar, University of Pennsylvania Kim Calder, UCLA Department of English Suzana Poghosyan, Owner/ Honey Pump Gallery Kelsey Halliday Johnson, Independent Artist/SPACE Aram Jibilian, Artist/Social Worker Jamie Patterson, Freelance Visual Researcher Gwen Comings, Independent Artist Rosy Kuftedjian, Artist Shoghig Halajian, Curator Taryn Haydostian, Independent Artist Narineh Mirzaeian, Design Faculty A.UD UCLA Amin Husain, MTL Collective Christina Lehmejian-Karaszewski, None Shaun Gannon, Independent Poet Alan Serna, Feral Press Carmina Escobar, Independent Artist Nelly Sarkissian, Art Director Lynn Hilloowala, Futurecollect Mariam Arzuyan, Independent Artist Tamar Salibian, MFA, Media Studies PhD Candidate, Claremont Graduate University Ani Ishkhanian, Independent Artist Seda Mimaroğlu, Independent Poet Sevana Panosian, Poet/Teacher Nathalie Halajian, Student Nicole Burmeister, Artist/Student Román Luján, Poet/Translator Soyoung Shin, Independent Artist