Future Nostalgia is a project that connects the past and the present. Andrew Egan and Lia Chavez searched in the attic archives of the Bellport-Brookhaven Historical Society. What they found that moved them most were shawls, skirts, beaded bags, fans, and a “panier” to fill the skirt of a woman and make her more “coquettish.” All are objects that local residents, who lived here before us, relished, wanted to preserve and offered to us, the future residents. 

Andrew, like so many of us, was drawn to Bellport by its quiet charm and sense of history. In Future Nostalgia, he invites us to see our history not as static relics, but as living, breathing elements of memory and identity. His model Lia offers her haunting beauty and elegant body movements to embody this inspiration. Through the lens of fashion, gesture, and light, the garments from the society’s archives find new voice. And perhaps most magically, many of these pieces may have once lived in the very homes we now cherish.

This work reminds me of the many stories preserved in our small village. The Bellport-Brookhaven Historical Society holds treasures not only of fabric and thread, but of time, taste, and transformation. I hope this exhibition encourages you, as it has me, to look more closely at the beauty that surrounds us — and to support the institutions that preserve it.

With admiration and affection,

Isabella Rossellini