RE-PLACE: Mapping the Story of FC

April 1, 2016: a fire blazed the Faculty Center, destroying generations worth of archives, book collections, cherished mementos, and invaluable research notes. In the wake of the first-year anniversary, the emotional aftershocks felt by the UP CAL and CSSP community of professors, administrative and support staff, and students continue to linger on. Bearing the gravity of this weight in the hopes of ultimately healing, the exhibit explores the narratives of loss and responses to the FC fire as a process of salvaging history.

Negotiations of spatial belonging are physical, psychological, and social. There is an attempt to map out a “sense of place” of individual as well as collective displacements and losses, struggles, and breakthroughs. With the hub of radicalism, intellectual zeal and endless discussion reduced to priceless memories, what are the surrogate spaces of coping which emerged in the aftermath of the fire? How is an awareness and recognition of “place” crucial to a broader understanding of UP history and trajectory?

Synergism exists between the process of healing and a counterflow of recollections, unfolding a timeline of mini-narratives linked together to form the larger story of FC. Along with the exhibition of interactive art, and published memories, the timeline encourages the community’s on-site insertions, propelling everyone to move forward with an outlet of desires for renewal and rebuilding.