Initially conceived in 2019, Talk With Your Mouth Full is a series of artist-led potluck brunches held at Black Cube Headquarters (BCHQ). These seasonal brunches are intended to build community among artists and arts enthusiasts through a shared meal and a communal group activity.

Each brunch celebrates one artist from the Denver area. Featured artists shape the shared meal in two ways: by choosing an ingredient for a main dish prepared by a local chef, and by leading an activity designed to foster conversation and community-building. Past ingredients have included butter (Devon Dikeou) and hot dogs (Amber Cobb), while a notable past activity took shape as art world bingo (Sophie Lynn Morris).

Bring a dish, get to know your fellow art world neighbors, and let an artist guide you through a convivial experience of their design. Free and open to the public, with a $5 suggested donation. RSVPs required (check back for links); capacity is limited.

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ABOUT THE ARTISTS

April 12—Alvin Gregorio

Alvin Pagdanganan Gregorio has spent his adult life pursuing the expressions of immigration, family, globalism, violence, war, spirituality, post-nomadism and the defense mechanisms used to contain and navigate these issues. Gregorio received his MFA from Claremont Graduate University in 2000 and soon after was awarded a Fulbright Research Fellowship to the Philippines. His work has been collected internationally and has been exhibited in such cities as Los Angeles, San Francisco, Denver, New York City,Hong Kong, Beijing, Singapore, Turin, New Delhi, Seoul, Jerusalem, Manila, Jakarta, Paris and Mexico City. He is represented by the Drawing Room Gallery in Manila. Gregorio is currently an Associate Professor of Arts Practices in Drawing & Painting at the University of Colorado Boulder. He is based in Boulder, CO and North Orange County, CA with his partner and teenage child.

April 26—Esther Hernandez

Esther Hernandez is a multidisciplinary artist and Chief Curator at Union Hall. Her work explores the intersection of art, ritual, and embodied experience through installation, performance, and interactive environments. Hernandez previously served as Associate Director at PlatteForum, where she managed an international artist residency, immigrant artist mentorship program, youth education program, podcast, and exhibition space. She has mentored young artists through the Creator’s Studio and Failure Lab programs at the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver and worked as Executive Assistant at Black Ball Projects.

Committed to supporting emerging artists and expanding how audiences engage with contemporary art, Hernandez has curated numerous experimental exhibitions and creative events, including projects developed during her residency at RedLine Contemporary Art Center. Her installations and performances are known for transforming gallery spaces into participatory experiences.

May 3—Apple Hultz

Apple Hultz (they/she) is an interdisciplinary artist working primarily in contemporary performance practices. Their work explores the liberatory and transcendent capacities of art, uplifting Queer experience through embodied and intuitive processes. Guided by somatic and spiritual inquiry, Apple investigates the intersections of the physical and the metaphysical, the human and the divine. Apple’s lived experience as a trans non-binary artist informs a body-based exploration of what it means to be alive, to feel, and to connect through shared human experience. Originally from Denver, Colorado, Apple has traveled and worked internationally in places like Guatemala, Spain, and Portugal. Through their work, Apple hopes to ignite a more colorful, Queer, and creative world bound by connection and authentic expression.

May 17—Rafael Fajardo

Rafael Fajardo (he/him) is an artist, designer, researcher, and educator. Born in Colombia, he migrated with his parents to the United States in 1968 and grew up in San Antonio, Texas. Rafael earned his BA and BFA from the University of Texas at Austin and an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design. He is currently a professor of Emergent Digital Practices at the University of Denver. Through his work with SWEAT, Rafael has been creating boundary-blurring videogames as an art form since 2000. SWEAT’s earliest games, Crosser and La Migra, were featured in ReVisión, a 2022 exhibition at the Denver Art Museum. Rafael also collaborates with artists Adán De La Garza and Justin Ankenbauer under the moniker of Dizzy Spell to curate a series of pop-up artist game arcades.