Sharing Secrets At San Francisco Art Show
Five years have passed since Frank Warren started "Post Secret," an ongoing art project where people mail him anonymous secrets on postcards. Now the postcards are on display at a gallery in San Francisco. Visitors to the exhibit whisper their secrets into producer Martina Castro's microphone.
MADELEINE BRAND, host:
We all have secrets - you do, I do. Frank Warren has a lot of them, thousands. They're actually not really his secrets. They were sent to him by strangers for his art project. That project is called "Post Secret." It's a collection of postcards with all those secrets written on them. They're on display now at a gallery near San Francisco. KALW's Martina Castro went on a secret mission to see the postcards.
MARTINA CASTRO: So, I'm standing just outside the Bedford Gallery in a lobby, and just inside the gallery, there are people walking around looking at the postcards from the "Post Secret" exhibit. And so, as they come out, I'm going to ask them to share a secret with me.
(Soundbite of music)
CASTRO: OK, so you put the headphones on, and take the recorder off into a corner and you whisper the secret in, whatever it is, and I'll never know it's you.
(Soundbite of music)
Unidentified Man #1: These people are crazy.
(Soundbite of music)
Unidentified Woman #1: I'm afraid no one will ever love me, and I'll die alone with a lot of cats.
Unidentified Woman #2: It's not that I don't think I'm worthy. It's - I'm just scared that other people don't think I am.
Unidentified Man #2: My friends don't know I'm rolling on ecstasy.
Unidentified Woman #3: Scared that I convinced myself that I love him when I don't even know what love is.
CASTRO: Awesome, thank you so much. Would you humor me in an exercise to tell me a secret off the top of your head?
Unidentified Woman #4: I can do it right now. I'm just - oh, man. I've been an emotional wreck the last couple of days. I know exactly what it is. I mean...
CASTRO: Oh, well, go. Do it.
Unidentified Woman #5: Oh, I'm afraid my boyfriend will come back from Iraq and not like the person that he sees, just remember me and all of my quirks through text instead of through reality.
(Soundbite of music)
Unidentified Woman #6: I'd rather deny who I was than face my grandma not talking to me anymore.
Unidentified Woman #7: When I'm with the guys, I joke around about checking out other girls with them, but I'm not really joking because I'm gay.
(Soundbite of music)
BRAND: Those secrets were confessed into Martina Castro's microphone. She's a producer based in San Francisco. The "Post Secret" exhibit will be on display in Northern California until April 19th. You can see some of those postcards at our blog, npr.org/daydreaming.
(Soundbite of music)
BRAND: More secrets revealed as Day to Day continues.
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