Incubator Space Initiators: Jacque D. Bailey and Sara Ickow

When it opened a little over a year ago (link to newsroom piece), ICP’s Incubator Space was conceptualized as a free, public exhibition space showcasing emerging and in-progress photojournalism and documentary work. Located on the first floor, its purpose is to convey ICP’s mission of concerned photography and inspire visitors as soon as they enter the building. The Incubator Space’s most valuable qualities are how malleable and responsive it is when compared with the exhibition program in ICP’s museum. Over the last year and a half, the Incubator Space has seen Mackenzie Calle's Gay Space Agency, Jon Henry's Stranger Fruit, and Oksana Parafeniuk's War Threads, which debuted at ICP, as well as Haruka Sakaguchi’s The Camps America Built, and Andrea Hernández Briceño’s Fire Becomes Sprit in 2026. In this interview, the initiators of the Incubator Space, Jacque D. Bailey, Director of Public Engagement and Sara Ickow, Associate Director of Exhibitions, reflect on the goals of the space and what it’s brought to the ICP Café. ICP: How did the idea for the Incubator Space come about? Jacque D. Bailey: About a year and a half ago my role here expanded from leading public programs to Director of Public Engagement, where I now also get to work with the visitor experience team, who keep our admissions desk, shop, and café running. I had produced public programs for ICP for the last 8–9 years and would hear a lot of real-time feedback from visitors. The resounding sentiment was that the first floor felt confused. So, we talked a lot with ICP’s leadership about how to bring the energy from upstairs down to that free public space—something that felt different and unique to ICP's voice. Sara Ickow: We are asked a lot of questions about how we show documentary photography and hear challenges to bring it more into our program. Two things I always come back to: it's hard to be timely and responsive with an exhibition program scheduled years in advance, and I'd been questioning what it means to put documentary work—which can be violent, painful—inside a white-box gallery. This space became the answer: not just featuring documentary and photojournalism, but letting photographers show work-in-progress, or show finished work in a new way, with more control than they usually get on the page. We've shown Mackenzie Calle's Gay Space Agency (circulated before, but not yet hung), Jon Henry's Stranger Fruit (previously published, but here focused on the process and labor behind it), and Oksana Parafeniuk's War Threads, which debuted at ICP. As well as Haruka Sakaguchi’s The Camps America Built, and Andrea Hernández Briceño’s Fire Becomes Spirit, neither of which had been exhibited before. ICP: Has it felt more nimble than being able to work around the timeline of the museum’s long-term schedule? JDB: Museum timelines typically run 2–3 years out, so having the flexibility to slot in something responding to real world events, or even something that happened six months ago, is a real advantage. It reflects what photography actually is. SI: It lets the photographers think that way too. Their timelines are so different from ours. Sometimes it's an assignment or sometimes a longer project with fits and starts. It lets them go back to older work and mix it with newer work. SI: In year one, the Incubator Space was really proof of concept. In year two we know what works, what timeline a project actually needs, and how photographers respond to the opportunity. We've found the right balance between booking far enough out and leaving room for things happening in the world we can't predict yet. ICP: How do the public programs come together alongside the exhibitions? JDB: With anything we do, a public entry point and access to our artists, faculty, students, and alumni is important. So, every Incubator Space artist gets some kind of public program, even if they're not local. With Oksana Parafeniuk, based in Ukraine, we held an online conversation that allowed a global audience, while with Haruka’s exhibition, we focused on connecting with youths by hosting an in-person family cyanotype paper–crane making workshop. SI: It's also a way to let the photographer tell us what they're interested in. We've gotten to see what kind of conversation each photographer wants to have. Haruka also wanted to bring in a descendant of one of the formerly-incarcerated people she photographed. Jon Henry wanted something more about institutional critique, so he brought in artist Zora J. Murff, and their conversation wasn't really rooted in the work itself, but instead about the systems you make that kind of work within. ICP: There's a tension between showing difficult work and putting it in a public café space. How do you navigate that? JDB: It's something we have to be really sensitive to and aware of. It's hard to have difficult images on the wall next to a cheerful conversation over a pastry. We try to handle serious issues with sensitivity and let people opt into harder narratives. SI: Agreed, it's about sensitivity. For example, always keeping the people in the photographs in mind, never exploiting what they've been through just to make the walls look good. I make different choices in that space than I would upstairs, where a difficult image might get its own separate room and a real moment of consideration. You're always mediating that. It's also about which project we choose to show from each photographer. That might be the real opportunity of a café space. You can show work that takes longer to land, because someone might sit there for an hour writing emails, or waiting for a friend. That's so much more time than anyone spends on a single work upstairs. We can show things that are conceptually difficult, because people spend this durational moment with it. ICP: How much is the relationship between what happens upstairs and downstairs part of the conversation? SI: Honestly, it's kind of freeing not to have to consider that interaction too closely. Because of our architecture, the whole museum changes over at once, so there's a period between our three annual cycles where the museum is completely closed. That's really where the proposition to the curatorial team started from: highlighting the need for work on the walls down there, telling people what this place is and what concerned photography means, even if they aren’t visiting the museum. JDB: I want the first floor to be a space people want to come to whether or not they've seen our exhibitions, whether or not they have the time or money for a ticket. I want them to feel welcome and inspired. We have free Wi-Fi, A/C year around, and a brand-new analog Model 11 photo booth. I want visitors to feel like they are part of our community and get curious about what's upstairs, whether that's taking a class or buying a ticket to a show. In addition to the Incubator Space, we've also launched a new Book on the Wall feature where we highlight a photobook and the process of making it, while supporting independent publishers. Together, both initiatives have really transformed what the first floor feels like. ICP: Are you seeing a response, in terms of patronage or feedback, since the transformation? SI: People who are in the building for other reasons are clearly drawn to what's going up there, even mid-process. We usually turn over the Incubator Space in about two days, and during that install, people are so interested, not just curiosity about a behind-the-scenes look, but they’ll ask questions about the work we’re installing. JDB: I agree! We’re seeing it in seat occupancy at any given time, and in patronage of the café and shop. We've seen an increase in support over the last year and a half. People will grab me downstairs and tell me they love hanging out here now. A couple nights ago a man told me this space used to feel kind of sad, and now it's his primary place to work outside his home. That's music to my ears, and exactly what we want our students and visitors to feel: that the first floor is an extension of your experience at ICP and you are welcome here.