two hundred and fifty-one days, curated by Elise Butterfield

The Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL

February 1, 2025 - May 26, 2025

two hundred and fifty-one days, a solo exhibition by Bryana Bibbs, is an artist's exploration of the mundane and yet profoundly emotional experience of losing loved ones. The title references the span of time between the death of Bibbs’ grandfather on December 18, 2023, and her grandmother on August 25, 2024. In late October of 2023, Bibbs, along with her mother, moved into her grandparents’ home to care for them through their final days.

In the first gallery, Bibbs reckons with the physical space of her grandparents’ home that she has since inherited. Here she has reinterpreted their Priscilla pink front room and the doors behind which they each died in large-scale weavings.

The center gallery contains black and white monoprints of Bibbs’ grandparents’ everyday items. Socks, adult bibs, back braces, favorite t-shirts, and hospital gowns appear as a testament to the bodies they touched.

The final gallery houses Bibbs’ Journal Series. Beginning a week after her grandfather’s death, Bibbs created daily weavings using materials that she found in her grandparents’ home. She took apart hospital blankets, tennis balls, and decks of cards, and remolded them into an account of that day’s emotional landscape.

two hundred and fifty-one days is Bibbs’ effort to process personal loss and the way that it reshapes our world at every layer. Lampshades, calendars, windows, and flowers – each object in two hundred and fifty-one days is an artifact of inheritance transformed by the power of Bibbs’ grief.

Exhibition catalogue available.

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