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player ready...Evanston artist Bruno Surdo recalls how in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Americans came together with a unifying sense of sadness and patriotism, plus an overwhelming urge to do something.
Some donated to relief funds, gave blood or did volunteer work. Surdo felt the need to create — especially after experiencing a vivid dream about the victims who died after the World Trade Center’s twin towers collapsed.
“When I woke up from the dream, I felt compelled to attempt a work of art,” Surdo, a 63-year-old first-generation Italian-American, said in a video. “I just felt that art serves a purpose and one of the reasons I became an artist is to make profound statements about humanity and the world, so I thought this piece had to be done.”
The resulting work is “Tragedy, Memory and Honor,” a massive 9′ x 35′ oil painting stretched across five panels that will be the centerpiece of “Honoring Resilience,” an exhibit commemorating the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.
It’s on display starting Sept. 11 at Gallery VICTOR, 300 W. Superior St., Chicago, and will be part of the 10th Annual River North Design District Fall Gallery Walk.
The exhibit will feature support materials such as Surdo’s original sketches from 25 years ago, written narratives to provide context, and artifacts collected from the site, which became known as “Ground Zero.”
While the painting has been displayed widely, this is the first time these additional items will be on view.
“I didn’t show them before because I didn’t want it to be about me,” Surdo, an adjunct professor at Columbia College, said in an interview. But, 25 years later, he thinks these materials “will help people find more layers to the story.”
The artifacts include pieces of the World Trade Center and dust and gravel from Ground Zero that he collected when he visited New York two weeks after the attacks occurred.
Some of the dust and gravel was mixed into his oil paints, which Surdo said “adds a sacred quality to the work.” Other artifacts include business cards and office memos he found and attached to the painting.
Surdo was able to gain access to the site thanks to a relative whose construction crew was helping with the excavation and removal of debris.
“My cousin Vinnie — just like the movie — was working at Ground Zero,” Surdo said. “He told me ‘Keep your mouth shut and follow me.’ Then he said ‘Don’t be obvious and do what you need to do.'”
At one point, Surdo said his cousin picked up a fragment of a World Trade Center building and shoved it into his jacket saying: “Take this. You’re going to need it.”
That fragment will be shown for the first time as part of the exhibit.
When visiting Ground Zero, Surdo said he was struck by the scale and the enormity of the destruction and the sulfurish smell, which were two things that couldn’t be grasped by seeing the site on television.
Surdo said he always admired epic paintings with a historical narrative such as Francisco Goya’s 1814 masterpiece “The Third of May 1808” and Pablo Picasso’s “Guernica,” which was painted in 1937 and depicted the bombing of the painting’s namesake city during Spain’s Civil War.
His goal was to put the same sensibility into his work, but his focus shifted somewhat after he witnessed Ground Zero.
“The firemen found another victim and the person was respectfully removed from the site,” Surdo recalled. “I didn’t see the physical body, but I saw it wrapped in a blanket and then, a few minutes later, I saw the faces of the family and their sadness and devastation.
“I was beyond overwhelmed and I realized then and there — and I really felt in my heart — that the true meaning of this painting was the honoring of these innocent people,” he added.
“I really wanted to memorialize the victims because that’s what moved me the most,” Surdo said. “When I got back to Chicago, I felt like I was on a mission.”
Along with other challenges of creating a 35-foot wide painting was that it was done in a 15-foot wide studio.
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“I could not stand back too far to see the whole image,” Surdo said. “
The painting was displayed in the Daley Center lobby in 2002 and 2003, where Surdo and others were able to view it in its entirety. It received praise from firefighters and other first responders. Another admirer was Mayor Richard M. Daley.
“He stood in front of it with me and he was overwhelmed with the how and why of what I created,” Surdo said. “I gave him a print of the piece and he was just respectful and complimentary of the effort and execution.”
Surdo acknowledged that he received some criticism for the painting and, perhaps more disappointing, indifference.
Some people just didn’t like the painting, while others accused him of trying to exploit a national tragedy to make a name for himself.
One man “cussed him out” on a phone message and that hurt at first, but then Surdo realized the painting must have at least made enough of an impression that it moved him to make such a call.
“I didn’t expect that but, if you put something out in public, you’re going to get all kinds of reactions,” he said.
Some walked past it without giving it more than a glance.
“I would go to the Daley Center on my lunch hour and watched how long people stayed with it,” Surdo recalled. “I know people are just trying to get to work or go from Point A to Point B, but I thought people would spend more time and process the work.
“A 35-foot mural has a certain weight to it,” he added. “As a creative individual, I don’t know what else you have to do to get people to stop and look.”
Surdo said he worked on the painting for six months and doing so “reinforced why I chose to be an artist.”
“I hope people will see that it was done with purity, honesty, and integrity,” he said.
The painting has been in storage for several years and Surdo praised Gallery VICTOR for getting it back before the public.
“It’s a commercial venue and this work is more historical,” he said. “I’ll be curious to see how people respond now 25 years later — or how young people react seeing something like this for the first time.”