Join Dittmar Memorial Gallery for opening reception The Names We Give to Home, featuring the works of Lelia Byron. Reception will take place in Dittmar gallery from 6-8pm.
This exhibition grew out of conversations with approximately 40 residents of Springfield, Ohio, about the topic of “home.” The resulting paintings function as visual narratives showing how participants understand “home” as something continually created through relationships, memory, care, and collective action. The paintings move between intimate and collective experiences: the creation of a community food garden, the restoration of a historic Underground Railroad safehouse, the sustaining role of creativity in everyday life, and a couple’s commitment to community through education and public service. Together, these stories reveal how larger social and economic forces are experienced through neighborhoods, families, friendships, and acts of mutual care.
The questions raised here extend beyond a single city, addressing themes relevant to communities across the U.S. that are navigating the effects of deindustrialization while actively imagining and building new futures. The exhibition asks what home can mean today—and what becomes possible when people imagine it together.
Cost: Free to all!
Dittmar Gallery
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