CASSIE LEE REEDER
PRATT INSTITUTE, BROOKLYN, NYC
Boyd’s Station is both a place and a historical moment for me. I have worked full time since I left for college after high school. I worked through my undergrad and graduate degrees and never had the time to focus just on the work. Boyd’s Station gave me that. It was the first time in my life I have been able to simply focus on my passion and to do that without guilt was something magical. At Boyd’s Station, I had the freedom to explore the grounds, to exercise and experience beauty, I had room to build and not be confined by spatial limitations or rules designed by someone who never made art. The studio was larger than I could have dreamt.
I was able to accomplish things I never would have had the space or means to do so in my home or to afford the space for back in Brooklyn. I also made new friends and was able to really take a deep look at the work I was making and my expectations for it. Being at Boyd’s Station set me up to lean into a very long term project that I truly believe in, that I feel is important, and I felt supported in that endeavor, and few things are that valuable as a person and as a maker.
Cassie Lee Reeder, a 2020 Boyd’s Station PLACE & SPACE creative resident, spent the time and space at Boyd’s Station to fabricate and build the transportation mechanism to display her personal work outside of the traditional gallery exhibition space by repurposing an old Harrison County, Kentucky hay wagon discarded in a farm burn pile 15 years prior to the residence at Boyd’s Station.
