Artist Diana Thater and CMACC’s Cass Fino-Radin On Redbuilding an Archive After Disaster |
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Artist Diana Thater and CMACC’s Cass Fino-Radin On Redbuilding an Archive After Disaster
A year after the Los Angeles wildfires destroyed her studio, Thater is working with CANYON to trace the scattered remnants of her work across institutions and private collections.
Last month marked the first anniversary of the fires in Los Angeles that burned over 37 square miles and destroyed 6,837 structures. Many were artist studios, and among them was the studio of Diana Thater, the brilliant video artist who lost her entire archive in the fire. Luckily, this story has a semi-happy ending, as she has begun working with New York’s newest cultural institution, CANYON, which is dedicated to time-based art. We caught up with Thater and Cass Fino-Radin, head of the Canyon Media Art Conservation Center, to learn more about her loss and what she is doing to recover her archive.
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Diana, I want to begin by talking about your losses in last year’s fires in Los Angeles. What was your experience in that tragedy?
DT: It all burned down. We lost everything, millions and millions of dollars’ worth of art. My entire archive was lost, except for what my husband grabbed on his way out of the house. Luckily, I have a very good database, so I was able to determine which works are gone forever and which ones I might be able to locate by borrowing from collectors or institutions.
I’m not a person who casually uses the word trauma. I actually object to how it’s used in culture right now; everything is labeled a trauma. But this truly qualified as a severely traumatic event in my life. In one night, I lost everything I’ve ever had. The next day, all we owned were toothbrushes in a plastic bag. That was it. We kept our three cats—I rescued the cats, and my husband rescued the server. It was horrific. It was terrifying. We fled the fire, and a month later, we found an apartment and settled in for a year, but now we’re moving again. It’s been a real struggle, not just with my work but with my life and my life as an artist.
How did the relationship between you and CANYON begin?........