The large wall projection from "The people who used to live here. A celebration of the Eastern European immigrants who populated Slavic Village....For My Grandmother"
2014. A room installation for Slavic Village, Rooms to Let. Rooms to Let was a community celebration where local artists were given abandoned or foreclosed homes for two days in a neighborhood particularly decimated by this, to create art and change perceptions. I recreated a living room. A living room is the space where families congregate. It is where many families hold the special moments in life. To celebrate the people who used to live here, I projected life size images of Bohemian people dancing in their ethnic costumes on the largest wall. The room contained three other video screens, one with the object mappings of Leigh Silverblatt, one with a slideshow of the Polish family who used to live there, the other with a slideshow of images of my ancestors, originally from Czechoslovakia,from the era when the area was their home. The room had other objects and a bit of furniture to bring to life a scenario of a family. The house was that of a Polish worker and his family. My own family lived further out on Union and also off Kinsman. I created my grandmother's living room. I dressed in the costume of a Bohemian woman of a century back, to honor my family roots.
