Peter Berra

First things first, 

I acknowledge that most of my work is created in Tiohtià:ke/Montréal on the unceded Indigenous lands of the Kanien’kehá:ka/Mohawk Nation. Kanien’kehá:ka is known as a gathering place for many First Nations, and recognize the Kanien’kehá:ka as the true custodians of the lands and waters on which we gather and reside. As an individual parent, artist, teacher and citizen, I recognize the irreversible crimes and injustices caused to all the indigenous communities as well as the systemic racism that is deeply embedded in all aspects of society, including the government institutions in which we rely on.  

Peter Berra is a photo-based artist of an Italian-immigrant working-class family and, for most of his life, lives in Montreal but hesitates to call this place home—feeling like a stranger in his city of birth resulted in several moves in a relatively small territory. The concept of home is important to him, and equally so, one associated with an inclusive and tolerant community that isn’t strictly governed by the politics of the times.

His recent work, “Interior Spaces,” currently deals with memory, displacement, and connection and how these concepts manifest in private and personal spaces, such as one's home. The photos are a gateway to spaces situated around still and quiet rooms that seemingly contain traces of memories waiting to be found amongst the daily routines of its occupants. The rooms and places are generations old, with floors that creak through tempered walls and windows that whistle on windy nights like secret messages urging us to look past our boundary walls like it is an emergency. 

Driven to document common and unique human experiences, Berra’s work often carries a sense of lyricism that often straddles between fiction and non-fiction. Centring on the documentation of material objects and communal and private spaces, we have grown accustomed. His work gives importance and validity to the ordinary by imbuing present-day objects and situations with an arbitrary historical context.