The Cantor Art Gallery at the College of the Holy Cross is featured in Worcester Living Magazine’s “10 Years Anniversary Issue.” The article, “Bearing Witness,” focuses on the gallery’s current exhibition: “Katrina Then and Now: Artists as Witness.” The exhibition reflects on the 10 years following Hurricane Katrina’s impact on New Orleans.
Roger Hankins, director of the Cantor Art Gallery, explains how the exhibit is broken into two parts in order to focus what he calls the “exhibition narrative” into chapters. The first part focuses on the hurricane and immediate aftermath, subtitled “Documenting, Describing and Dealing with Disaster” and will be open to the public until Oct. 10. The second part, subtitled “The Rebirth of Art” will be on view in the gallery from Oct. 22-Dec.18.
Daina Cheyenne Harvey, assistant professor of sociology at the College with personal ties to New Orleans, came up with the idea of bringing works by New Orleans artists to Holy Cross while working to help rebuild the Lower Ninth Ward, where the worst of Katrina’s flooding and devastation took place. Joining with Susan Rodgers, a colleague and professor of sociology and anthropology, Harvey had a change of heart about bringing an artistic perspective to the story of Katrina. “Then I thought that maybe this would be a really unique and maybe fun way to show what was going on in New Orleans,” he is quoted saying in the article, “rather than the suffering and the pain and loss and abandonment that I’d been writing about.”
Harvey continues “[The artists] were very eager to talk about it [Hurricane Katina]. It seemed the city was finally ready to reflect upon it, particularly because the 10th anniversary was coming up and people were beginning to take stock of where they were and how they had moved on.”
Harvey believes the exhibition's visual message of hope amid catastrophic loss and despair will come through in a direct way to the public and, especially, his students. “I can have them read my books and articles and things like that but this tells the story in a completely different way, in a more accessible way” he said.
- Read the entire article in Worcester Living Magazine.
Related Information
- Hurricane Katrina Exhibit at Holy Cross Featured on National Radio
- Cantor Art Gallery Presents 'Katrina Then and Now: Artists as Witness'
This “Holy Cross in the news” item is by Emma Collins ’16
