REWRITING LOSS: PHOTOGRAPHS BY CARLA SHAPIRO
September 11 – October 24, 2021Virtual Artist Talk
Wednesday, October 20th at 2:00 pm EST
The Center for Photography at Woodstock will be hosting a virtual artist talk with Carla Shapiro discussing the current exhibition, Rewriting Loss: Photographs by Carla Shapiro, on Wednesday, October 20th at 2:00 pm EST. Following the talk will be a brief Q&A session.
Viewers can watch the live stream on CPW’s Facebook Page.
Rewriting Loss: Photographs by Carla Shapiro was shown at CPW in 2011 to honor the 10th anniversary of the events of September 11, 2001. We are pleased to bring back this breathtaking exhibition to commemorate the 20th anniversary, those who lost their lives, their family and friends, and the resiliency of the human experience.
“In honor of those who died on 9/11, I hand-copied the obituaries of 2,500 of the victims of the World Trade Center from The New York Times. Each obituary was written in black ink on white vellum, a stiff translucent paper. I wrote for four hours a day for five months. As I wrote I became intrigued with the words that represented each person and created a project that was full of peace rather than death. The handwritten pages were hung in the country air to weather away like the wind and sun-faded the writing and the rain and snow washed them clean. Over time, as the written words washed away the papers became “prayer flags”. Prayer flags, originating in Tibet, are visual reminders of prayer; they are left to sway in the wind, and each snap and flutter is an utterance of prayer.
Over the course of one year, I photographed these obituaries – in the early light, in darkness, in the rain, as the leaves fell, and as it snowed. They were photographed in stillness. They were photographed when it was hot and when it was cold, as they moved and as they froze. They were photographed with the rebirth of spring.
For 12 months the obituary-prayer flags hung in lines across the stream in my backyard in Chichester, New York. In each season they moved in the breeze, generating song throughout their movement, and creating patterns of light and dark as they became part of the life around them. Each day I saw a new story, as every sheet of vellum became free of its words and transformed into the pure whiteness I waited for – my way of honoring those who had died.”
– Carla Shapiro, 2011
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Carla Shapiro is a photographer and educator based in the Catskill Mountains of Upstate New York. Her photographic projects explore loss and longing, memory and nostalgia, womanhood, aging, and the human condition, often situated in the rural and natural landscapes that surround her home and studio in the mountains. She frequently employs the use of alternative photographic equipment, processes, and materials, such as platinum printing, the wet-plate collodion process, pinhole cameras, and specialty papers, all of which have the effect of creating unique and tactile works.
Virtual Walkthrough
PLANNING YOUR VISIT
Carla Shapiro’s exhibition, Rewriting Loss, will be on view through October 10 in CPW’s Kodak Gallery. Kelli Connell’s exhibition, Double Life. Twenty Years, will be on view concurrently through November 27.
CPW’s exhibitions are free and open to the public due to the continued support from the New York State Council on the Arts, the National Endowment for the Art, Joy of Giving Something, the Phillip and Edith Leonian Foundation, our members and other supporters.
This exhibition will be viewable as a virtual walkthrough via Matterport, made possible with funds from the NYSCA Electronic Media/Film in Partnership with Wave Farm: Media Arts Assistance Fund, with the support of the New York State’s Governor’s Office and the New York State Legislature.
PLEASE NOTE: Due to the covid-19 pandemic, CPW gallery is open to walk-in visitors on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, 12 noon – 4pm. A covid-19 safety protocol applies.