(Photo courtesy Bobby Hermida)
ORLANDO | The LGBT+ Center Orlando will be home to an art installation, presented by Stars of Hope, built to remember the 49 lives lost at Pulse on June 12, 2016.
The piece — titled “Together Again,” named after the 1997 Janet Jackson song — will feature 49 stars suspended from the ceiling and is being created by Central Florida artist and muralist Kim Murphy, whose most recent mural can be seen on the outside wall of The Center Orlando.
“We knew we wanted to use stars,” Murphy says. “It started out as 49 portraits but we moved away from that because we know that there are concerns with some of the families not necessarily wanting their loved ones’ images to be displayed, which we totally understand. So we wanted to do something that was still representative so we’re having the names of every person on a star. Then on the other side we will have a message of hope written in both English and Spanish.”
The use of the stars comes from Stars of Hope, a nonprofit that uses art as therapy to help survivors and communities impacted by natural and human-caused disasters. The organization’s signature wooden stars will be the focal point of Murphy’s exhibit.
“We were just going to attach them to the wall but they’re three dimensional so we thought it would be great if they were hanging from the ceiling,” Murphy says. “From there it grew to the idea of hanging it from the ceiling as a mobile. It’s going to almost look like a giant chandelier.”
The idea for Stars of Hope to partner with The Center Orlando came from local activist Bobby Hermida. Hermida met Burns while working at a respite tent next to Stars of Hope at Pulse on the one-year mark of the shooting. Hermida reached out in December with an idea to collaborate and honor those impacted by the tragedy.
Stars of Hope first brought their stars to Orlando the morning after the Pulse tragedy.
“When Pulse happened, we had our director of operations down here and we were here using our therapeutic art program to work with the community,” says Kelly Burns, program manager and art therapist for Stars of Hope. “I think we made over 2,000 stars during that time and a lot of the stars got sent to other communities that were affected by gun violence as well.”
“Together Again” will open June 3 with an event from 6-8 p.m. at The Center Orlando and will be on display for the entire month of June. Stars of Hope will make paint kits available to anyone who visits the opening of the show. For more information on the opening event, visit The Center Orlando’s Facebook event page and to learn more about Stars of Hope, visit StarsOfHopeUSA.org.
