[Swi:t] Home: A Chant (2001-2006)

The New Museum in New York presents the artist Elena del Rivero with [Swi:t] Home: A Chant (2001-2006) in the atrium of the gallery, to mark the tenth anniversary of the September 11 attacks.

 

Elena del Rivero's studio/home in New York stood opposite the World Trade Center when it was attacked in 2001. After the explosions the studio was left blanketed in ash, dust and rubble. When the attack struck del Rivero was away in Spain, and on her return to New York she began the painstaking task of restoring and cataloguing office and personal notes and documents which had been scattered around her apartment when the towers came down. Between 2001 and 2006 Elena del Rivero cleaned up the remains and stitched them by hand onto rolls of cloth. These long rolls of cotton, hung from the ceiling of the New Museum's atrium, suggest a waterfall or clouds of smoke, turning the installation into a powerful evocation of the historical weight of the event and the lives of the people affected by the attack. Viewers will see 3,136 pieces of burnt paper carefully stitched onto rolls of cotton mesh.