Exhibition (re)collection - A collaboration with Lost and Found: Family photos Swept by th

Featuring new work by seven artists -Mark Baugh-Sasaki, Ariel Goldberg, Mayumi Hamanaka, Taro Hattori, Sean McFarland, Kari Orvik and Kelli Yon - in response to the thousands of photographs recovered from the city of Yamamoto after the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan on March 11, 2011.
Eyewitness accounts described Yamamoto as “one of the worst-hit areas” with no houses left undamaged. The artists’ new work will be installed alongside these photographs by Japanese photographer Munemasa Takahashi, in the months following the disaster to help raise awareness of the continuing relief efforts in Japan. This exhibition looks at how much photography is a part of our lives, the universality of photos, and the tragedy of when those moments, emotions, and memories captured in photographs are swept away in an instant. “After the disaster occurred, the first thing the people who lost their loved ones and houses came to look for was their photographs,” Takahashi says. “Only humans take moments to look back at their pasts, and I believe photographs play a big part in that. This exhibit makes us think of what we have lost, and what we still have to remember about our past.” This exhibition was organized in part by Ivan Vartanian, an independent curator and publisher based in Tokyo, Japan.