Baha Mar presents ‘Buildings are People Too’

The Nassau Guardian

Baha Mar presents ‘Buildings are People Too’

The Current at Baha Mar is excited to present Buildings Are People Too, an exhibition by their first two artists-in-residence at The Current art studio, emerging artists Piaget Moss and Veronica Dorsett.

Buildings Are People Too is an art exhibit that explores ideas about the nature of construction, particularly as it relates to the hotels at Baha Mar.

“I think the thing to take away in this exhibition is a documentation of a certain time period,” said Veronica Dorsett. “Once the opening happens, people will see the shiny finished product, not the dirty gloves and nails and wood that got us here.”

“We want to present these fragments to people for them to consider when they think about this moment in history,” she explained. “I almost think of us like the Baha Mar archeologists, in a sense.”

Audiences are invited to explore the grandeur of buildings and the moments of life they cloak, hoping to promote discourse about the delicate and typically unseen elements of construction.

Juxtaposing portraits of the workers on the Baha Mar development site with salvaged material from the grounds itself, the exhibition explores notions behind the animation of development, the crossing and integration of cultures and the presence of individuals that cultivate exchanges and experiences throughout the construction process.

“I want people, Bahamians especially, to know that the building of this development is not as systematic as they think,” explained Piaget Moss. “I want them to understand these people and their immense individual lives are invested in our little country and want to build our economy.”

Two distinct bodies of work, stemming from separate perceptions — one made in response to experiencing the site from the inside and the other made exclusively from the perspective of an onlooker — will share a single space in The Glass Bridge, the first gallery opening to the public under The Current’s dynamic art program for Baha Mar.

The Current is the unifying force behind the collective art moments across Baha Mar, including a network of art spaces across the development with provocative programming.

The three art galleries under the umbrella of The Current will create special and sophisticated experiences of visual art for its guests as well as broaden opportunities for visibility for the thriving local art community.

Located in a spacious hallway space at the Melia hotel, The Glass Bridge will give viewers a look into creative practice within the contemporary art landscape. Focusing on contemporary, project-based exhibitions by emerging artists, this gallery will offer candid examinations of creative ebb and flow while also providing a significant platform for up-and-coming artists to present their work to a wider global audience.

“The Glass Bridge at the Melia is an amazing space for a full blown gallery, with traffic from people hailing from all parts of the world,” said Dorsett. “That is an unique and exciting opportunity. We hope it will generate a lot of conversations about art here in The Bahamas and act as a stepping stone for other art spaces and artists here in our country.”

Moss and Dorsett, both emerging artist from Grand Bahama who have studied art at The College of The Bahamas, worked exclusively in the temporary Current studio space for four weeks exploring their chosen subject matter through individual creative processes.

This first experience is helping The Current form a dynamic residency program offering both local and international artists a chance to work in the future studio space for significant periods of time towards groundbreaking exhibitions.

“We are entirely grateful to Baha Mar for this experience,” said Moss. “We love having this chance to be the archeologists — no one else will come into this project at this time and come away with the same thing that we have come away with from the site.

“I’ve never been in a residency with such great freedoms and trust. It’s been good for challenging my creative process.”

Buildings Are People Too opens Thursday, July 31 at 6 p.m. at The Melia on One Baha Mar Boulevard. The space is east of the Melia’s check-in counter. The event is free and open to the public.

For more about The Current, email art@bahamar.com.

 

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