‘An Enduring Sense of Place’

Multimedia artist Sherrard Bostwick moved to Hoboken just five years ago, but already the city has made quite an impact on her artwork. Her newest exhibit, The River Runs Two Ways, at the Hoboken Historical Museum on Hudson Street, explores layered photography, paintings, stitchery, and other media inspired by her experience living in the Mile Square. There will be a free reception held at the museum on Sunday, Sept. 12 from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m., and her work will be on display until Sunday, Oct. 24.

Patch spoke with Bostwick this week and the artist revealed a little more about herself.

Q: What does it mean to be a multimedia artist? What media do you use?

A: In this case, I'm working in a sort of more traditional multimedia. I went to graduate school in multimedia art because I was interested in how nonvisual artists, dancers, performers… how they are put on the spot to perform before an audience. As a studio artist, a visual artist, the performance of your art takes a longer time often. A painting make take 10, 20 hours, 50 hours, depending on the painting and then, it's hung in the gallery and you're often not there to see it received. For me, it was understanding how I could share the process of making art with an audience. For instance, much of the artwork in this exhibit is layered like sandwiched photographs, so I have taken a photograph and using digital media – I've used it like a paint brush – I've painted it like you would paint on a canvas. Most of the art in this exhibit are these sandwiched images.

Q: What does the name of your exhibit mean?

A: The whole exhibit is based on the idea that the river in Hoboken is a very constant thing, but it is always changing. You go to the east side of Hoboken and you realize that the river is always there, but it's changed. It's not the same water. The name for the exhibit actually comes from the Lenape, the first peoples that lived here, the native people. Their name for the river meant "a river runs two ways." When the tide comes in, it's saltwater, and when the tide is going out, then the freshwater goes out into the New York Harbor. In Hoboken, there was this wave of immigration that gave the town its culture, then there was this other wave. The Dutch came first, then the Germans, then the Italians. The Stevens family that bought the land after the Revolutionary War made it a park and created the Elysian Fields. The Stevens Family continued to develop Hoboken into a shipping port. There were all these pretty substantial changes that happened here, but the town still has this enduring character. That change seems to give us an enduring sense of place.

Q: What can people expect at your new exhibit?

A: Drawings, photography, needlepoint or stitchery, and painting, all relating to the experience of coming to Hoboken and discovering this as a place. There is one painting that is a particular magnolia tree that really overwhelms me every spring. There are also the sandwiched photographs. I've made them quite small and precious. They are images of the river layered with images of Hoboken. There's also a drawing that I did the morning after the election in 2004. That's the first time I came to Hoboken to live for a while. Bush was elected and there was a lot of fear at that time of having to go to war.

Q: Are you a Hoboken native? Where are you from?

I grew up in Pittsburg, Pa. My father was transferred to New York City to work when I was a senior in high school, so I moved to New Jersey as a 16-year-old and have lived lots of different places. Hoboken first came on my map when I was commuting into New York from the suburbs. I've lived in Europe, across the United Sates…. My sister and parents were both here, and that's why I came back to go to grad school in 2005, so I have been here pretty briefly compared to most Hobokenites.

Q: What does Hoboken mean to you?

A: I think that it has a feel of a small, strong community, a very intimate community, where you know your dry cleaner and your shop keeper. It has a very rich history where things that have happened here have affected the whole world. All the soldiers left from here for World War I. Because of all the different waves of immigration that have come to Hoboken, the culture is very rich. It's not at all isolated, but there's a strong sense of a community where you can really know people.

Q: Do you have an education in the arts?

A: I have a B.A. in Fine Arts from Hiram College, in Hiram, Ohio and a master's in performance and interactive media arts from CUNY's Brooklyn College. That was in 2008.

Q: Do you support yourself with your artwork? What do you do for a living?

A: I have always supported myself by education in the arts, and right now, I am an educator at the Hoboken Historical Museum.