Harvard art museum

review by Chloe Hoang

3/10/17

Disremembered II, 2014; Disremembered VI, 2015-16 are Doris Salcedo’s most recent work. She was inspired by interviews with the Chicago mothers who had lost their children to gun violence. The piece is made up of four pieces of silk thread and nickel-plated, hung on three white walls. The piece is shear greyish white, that represents the suffering of the victims: “vivid but ghostly traces of the lost bodies, deeply mourned by the families. What seemed so simple about the piece compared to a rather more complicated and bigger piece, in fact, holds so much meaning. The soft, light, and see through makes the victims’ stories look like open books. The blouses are all same shade with unstable shapes, easily blown away by light wind. This image is parallel to the victims, weak and vulnerable when facing the gun, and the similarity of the shades shows the way the killers see them: not as individuals, but objects. The soft silky blouses “appears and then disappears, like the memories that linger in those who grieve.” This heartbreaking piece holds incredible beauty not only within the presentation, but also the realistic meaning.