Photo Credit: Ashford Studios

Erin Ashford’s We Make a Home installation honors Redwood City and it’s workers and residents through physical, spiritual, and audio inclusion, making this installation a true collaboration. This artwork embodies and recognizes the City’s sense of community and inspired the artist’s desire to reach out to the community for her first public art installation.

Over 100 hands were cast with 45 voices recorded by the opening reception to set the stage of this ongoing and evolving installation. Throughout the month-long exhibition, the artist will continue engaging with her neighbors in the space as the home is developed. Community members can speak with her about the value and meaning of home, cast their hand, and view the installation from within, to experience the sense of safety provided by the diversity of neighbors’ hands that comprise the roof. The main viewing perspective is through the windows. However, Ashford felt it was most important for the community to participate in art-making and to hear fellow community members share their affirming stories of home in their own words. As hands are cast during the run of the exhibition, the metaphor of the roof builds and provides additional protection, just as our sense of community grows in Redwood City. In this way, everyone from the community is invited to participate in We Make a Home, just as everyone can participate in building our community via engagement with one another.

This visually stunning and sensitive artwork illustrates the complex interplay of biological and cultural influences that define and distinguish our species, and uses this fact as a platform to engage in local stories. These stories in relationship to the array of hands, exhibit human similarities, while at the same time, highlighting how our unique histories shape who we are. The artist feels that “Under one roof, we can participate in building a structure that reflects our differences, as we meet together to listen, and strengthen our sense of home.” No two hands are the same but are exhibited side-by-side to illustrate our unity. The process of co-creating the multi-colored hand casts fastened to the roof, coupled with the audio recordings of community voices, celebrate the home we can build together over time. The We Make a Home structure is built one hand at a time, and a tribute to the people who make Redwood City the place it is right now!