"How can we build the bonds necessary to transform the binds that hold us back?"

Binds & Bonds, is a site specific installation exploring the somatic experience in response to trauma and healing. Created by Israel-born artist Dafna Rehavia, the work is a process developed as part of a 2020 residency at BOOM Concepts.

This program is a new video work that walks audiences through the exhibit, and includes a live tour element with the artist. Also included is a collaborative dance piece featuring dancers Shana Simmons and Chezney Douglas. The movement experience creates a visceral and emotional reflection of the three responses to trauma: flight, fight, and freeze. Artwork and dance are bound together in unity demonstrating that through movement, healing begins.

Following the screening the artists will have a live virtual discussion with BOOM Concepts’ Darrell Kinsel and audience members.

Dafna Rehavia is a feminist, activist, mixed media artist, and art therapist. She immigrated and lives in Pittsburgh via Tel Aviv. In her exhibitions, she has explored existential and identity struggles from a personal and sociocultural view. Within this framework she explores the body-self and metaphors of the body as the site of injury. Rehavia has exhibited solo and group shows nationally and internationally including in Tel-Aviv, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, New-York, Boston, Amsterdam, and Wurzburg. She was awarded the Chelsea International fine arts award of Agora Gallery, New York 2015 for her work Cutting and recently completed an art residency in Wurzburg, Germany.

Shana Simmons (Shana Simmons Dance) is a dancer/choreographer/educator in Pittsburgh, PA. Her work is an immersive experience for audience members and speaks from the female perspective while reflecting important societal topics and trends on the human condition.

Chezney Douglas is a BIPOC interdisciplinary artist in pittsburgh. She focuses on bringing awareness and equality to her community through her art forms.

BINDS & BONDS: Symbolic Somatic Experience Presented by Boom Concepts