Migration Stories: Silent Witnesses - Synagogues Transformed, Rebuilt or Left Behind a group exhibition that will be at the Holocaust Center of Detroit Artists created work specifically for this exhibition: I'm tentatively calling this group of work "Stories End" a group of photos that create virtual altered books For a long time I’ve wanted to make some art about the lost world of my childhood in the South Bronx in the 1950’s. As time goes on, the world I grew up in becomes more and more remote. On one of my bookshelves is an old book, “Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends.” It was awarded from our Temple Sisterhood to my older brother. I discovered it when emptying my parents’ apartment. We owned very few books (I went to the library a lot) and I read this book over and over. This relic of my childhood has become the heart of this project. I’ve made a group of photos of this book that are virtually altered books. I took a drive one Sunday, photographing former synagogues of the Bronx. They are scattered all over, near the Yankee Stadium, in my old neighborhood of Highbridge, along the Grand Concourse (which my mother called “the Park Avenue of the Bronx). They are now transformed into churches, community centers, or abandoned, left behind as the community changed. Each photograph incorporates a synagogue photo and each photo contains pieces of a fairy tale text from that book showing the end of the stories, all fragments of a lost world. 2011 |
Aileen Bassis