Laura Schneider: Thymesis

The Project Space at NYU Abu Dhabi presents the works of faculty member and artist, Laura Schneider, in her solo exhibition, Thymesis, open to the public from September 24-October 7, 2019. The artist was inspired to title the exhibition Thymesis after learning about the medical condition, hyperthymesia, while reflecting on the role of autobiographical memory throughout her own work. “Hyperthymesia” derives from the Greek words hyper (“excessive”) and thymesis (“remembering”). People afflicted with hyperthymesia can remember every detail of their own life. Schneider reflects that “those of us without this condition perhaps forget more than we remember and are left to fill in the blanks.”

The exhibition includes mixed-media drawings, sculptures, projections, and an ongoing project, Earliest Memory Archive, here presented in the manner of a phone booth. Over the past five years, Schneider has recorded anonymous audio recollections of people from around the globe sharing their first memory. Visitors to the exhibition can record their own memories in this booth installation, a process that enables them to participate in the artist’s reflection upon autobiographical narratives. Alongside the Earliest Memory Archive, the exhibition presents the ongoing series, Thymesia, in which the artist uses mixed-media collage and drawing to explore family photographs of her mother and siblings when they were children, as well as semi-fictional animals.