For younger Americans born after the attacks, 9/11 is not a memory lived, but history learned. Twenty years later, we remember those who were killed, as we honor the service and sacrifice of the brave first responders who ran toward danger to save others. By showing this body of work, we want to encourage reflection and help ensure that a new generation learns how, together, we met unimaginable tragedy and unfathomable loss with hope, resilience, and unity.

An evocation of site, a remembrance of tragedy, a progression towards healing – Shai Kremer’s Concrete Abstract series at once aims for individual and universal response to the destruction and rebuilding of the World Trade Towers following September 11th, 2001. Kremer describes his Concrete Abstract series as a means to “pay homage to America, to New York, to their trauma and their recovery.” The artist evokes the renovations and rebuilding of a once devastated sight as representative of a fresh start and ongoing therapeutic process for New York City.

Like his past series, Kremer maintains “a post-traumatic gaze to the cityscape of Manhattan – and by extrapolation, to the sociological landscape of America.”

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Building Bridges Art Exhcnage’s Artist in Residence Program provides artists’ with a unique challenge by offering them the opportunity to create, in record time, a site specific body of work which requires a full time commitment. The program is an invitation for experimentation and research, which is carried out with curatorial accompaniment that supports the artist’s concepts, and provides different ways of exploring their own work.

For this year’s residency, artist Séverin Guelpa worked in a wide range of mediums: installations, objects, sounds, and photography, while exploring ideas of documentation, gathering, and analyzing life in the desert, an area he has worked in since 2014. This exhibition is the result of the artist’s exploration during the residency period, and deals with an unnamed phantom, a specter that haunts or perhaps shines a ghostly light onto the inner soul behind “the desert”. This mirage confuses and fascinates him; but despite this, he decides to explore the physical and emotional territory. Throughout the residency, Guelpa plunged into the wild, untamed landscape of the desert, the boulders, the iconic Joshua trees, and the vast terrain opening onto the Milky Way above. As a conceptual artist, Guelpa focused on a survey of the territory, its geography, and the underlying tensions and fragility of living systems in the desert.

The high desert has long been a refuge for intrepid creative characters and stories. It’s a place that attracts dreamers, undeterred by the inhospitable environment. Séverin Guelpa’s artistic proposal gives us the opportunity to access multiple layers of interpretation but, above all, to see the effects on people who decide to experience the desert’s apparent emptiness. With this exhibition, Guelpa connects the undeniable and surreal vistas of freestanding home structures with the relationship between the land, nature’s resources, and private property. He gives new meaning to the debris that has been cleansed by the desert, and brings new possibilities of composition that explores the forces of balance in chaos.

Jessie Chaney’s ongoing series Memory of a Space brings into focus numerous forlorn and overlooked sites the artist has encountered in her travels. These abandoned spaces are remnants of progress and change, empty buildings which provide evidence of previous inhabitants. Whether changes of fortune or the construction of new nearby highway leaves such places cut off and ultimately deserted, they still hold many telltale pointers to the lives and loves that once filled them.

Chaney finds beauty within the ruins and detritus that society leaves behind. Rather than mourn what has been lost, she celebrates the little details that provide glimpses into the past. This immersive installation both houses and echoes her artworks. Glimpses of other artworks appear as one navigates the space, and scrims provide veiled views though grimy windows, like those the artist encounters when peering into long-overlooked rooms. While Chaney’s photographs are essentially devoid of people, they still evoke an aura of humanity. The images tell stories through what has been left behind, fallen into ruin and often subsequently unofficially re-adorned with contemporary imagery. If her imagery conveys an air of nostalgia, it is not intended to be facile. Memory of a Space draws attention to the rapid changes in modern life, while celebrating small mementos of civilization.

Chaney began this body of work in earnest before the term ‘COVID-19’ was coined. Since then, as the global pandemic has continued, the series has assumed an additional gravitas, not influenced by prevailing political views or conspiracy theories. Focusing on the impact of societal change, Chaney’s abandoned spaces now might be seen as possible safe havens for the future.