Exactly a year after a fire ruined Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition’s home in Red Hook, its artists are reflecting on how the blaze has changed their lives and their work as they prepare to close a difficult chapter.
“One Year Later: New Work, New Perspectives,” featuring the work of dozens of BWAC member artists, opens on Sept. 17 at The Whale in Sunset Park, along with a national juried exhibition titled “Exclaim!”
On Sept. 17, 2025, a five-alarm fire broke out at the historic warehouse BWAC had inhabited for 35 years. The fire burned through the night, and by the following morning, it had destroyed dozens of small businesses and artists studios.
Nearly everything at BWAC — which had been preparing for its fall show – was destroyed, and the org learned a few months later that it would never be able to return to its longtime home.
The fire destroyed BWAC’s longtime home, along with dozens of small businesses and studios. File photo by Lloyd Mitchell
“When you’re in a fire, and you lose your home, what do you do? You move in with family or friends. And we’re finding family and friends we didn’t even know we had,” said BWAC president Alicia Degener.
In the last year, neighbors have stepped up to support the nonprofit and its mission of giving artists affordable space to exhibit. Powerhouse Arts offered free exhibition space for BWAC’s first post-fire show, the org is now using space at The Whale for a “nominal fee.”
“What we want to celebrate is the fact that artists are still creating,” said BWAC president Alicia Degener.
Degener said she lost around 80% of her body of work in the fire. BWAC wasn’t impacted by the flames, but by the millions of gallons of water pumped into the building to extinguish them. At “One Year Later,” she’s exhibiting a collection of water color paintings wrecked by the blaze.
“They got all washed away, except for the line drawing, which actually is still really beautiful,” she said. “ … I have one whole little room, it has like 12 of my watercolors that were washed away because of the fireboat. I mean, the fireboat saved the building, but my watercolors didn’t fare so well.”
Some artists stopped creating altogether after the fire, Degener said – not just BWAC member artists, but other people who had studios in the warehouse and found themselves without a place to work.
Conrad Wells’ painting ‘Good Neighbors’ survived the fire at BWAC last year. Image courtesy of Conrad Wells/BWAC 
Chuck Dorr’s piece “No One Sleeps” is featured in the exhibit. Image courtesy of Chuck Dorr/BWAC
“We have to continue. We have to keep making art, it’s important for our own well-being and mental health to do it,” Degener said. “My studio mate at The Whale literally lost everything … and we were just talking about how much better we feel now that we’ve made new art … it’s healing.”
Hisham Youssef had around five sculptures at BWAC when the fire tore through. A Pennsylvania resident, Yousseff joined BWAC after he was accepted to a few juried exhibitions there.
“The space was fantastic, in Red Hook. I was enthralled with the space and the ideas for the shows, the concepts for the shows were really interesting to me,” he said. “It’s also an opportunity to exhibit in New York, and then the people who I met were just open and inviting.”
Youssef was in Pennsylvania when the fire broke out, and heard about it from a friend. It was weeks before he and the rest of the artists could get inside to see what they could save. All of his pieces were saved, he said, and triaged by on-site art conservators — but none can be exhibited inside. Mold keeps growing back on the pieces, even after the conservators’ careful work and despite his best efforts treating them with rubbing alcohol to keep the growth at bay.
Among his ruined pieces was “100 Hands,” sculptures of his own hands — 50 left and 50 right — carved from wood harvested at his rural home.
Youssef’s piece “100 Hands” in the flooded warehouse last year. File photo courtesy of Alicia Degener 
Wells with his painting and Youssef’s reconstructed hands at The Whale. Photo courtesy of Alicia Degener
“I’m getting older and getting some aches in my hands and things like that. Which really upset me,” Youssef said. “And so I did 100 hands.”
For “One Year Later,” he recreated them.
“I didn’t want to make 100 hands again, just to replace, as if [to say], ‘OK, now they’re back to new.’ So I thought, in memory, I’m just going to do 20 … And I could see the differences in them. My hands are more swollen now. Coming up through construction and working with stores and working with concrete and working with timber and things like that, your hands wear out.”
Like Degener, Youssef feels encouraged seeing that he and his fellow artists have kept creating after experiencing such devastation.
“It’s what artists do, right? We are producing art … as hard as it’s been, everyone has. I can’t say it feels good, but I don’t even know what the word would be for it,” he said. “I think BWAC should be proud. And we can look at ourselves and we’re pushing ourselves, which I think is a good thing.”
BWAC artists have continued to make new work, despite the tragedy. Image courtesy of Lenore Fiore-Mills/BWAC
Degener said she hopes the show acts as a sort of bookend to the fire and its aftermath.
“The whole thing about showing the work that got quote-unquote ruined, I want people to see it. I want people to see what happened, and then we can move on,” she said. “Let’s close the book on it. You know, it’s been a year. What have we done? We found other places to exhibit. We’re re-finding ourselves. We’re reinventing ourselves. This is a 48-year-old nonprofit. It’s gone through many iterations of what it is and what it means to artists and what it gives to artists.”
The accompanying exhibit, “Exclaim!” is a national juried show featuring works with a strong message or call to action — whether it’s political or personal.
“That’s about just using your voice, “Degener said. “The world is just crazy right now. Half the world is at war, and all the other horrific things that are happening, [there are] just things that need to be said. So just use your voice.”
Candy Heiland’s piece “Use Your Voice” embodies the themes of the exhibit “Exclaim!” Image courtesy of Candy Heiland/BWAC
The space BWAC is using at The Whale has beautiful views of Manhattan, she said, with 15-foot ceilings, and it spans 21,000 square feet, almost as large as the old BWAC in Red Hook. It’s not a permanent home — Degener and the team are still searching for a but for now, it’s letting BWAC serve its artists the way it always has.
“I know in my heart we’re not going back to Red Hook, and I don’t want to be sad about it because I’m not,” she said. “You know, life changes and that’s it. We’re still together. We’re still doing BWAC. BWAC is still BWAC. That’s just somewhere else in Sunset Park.”
“One Year Later: New Work, New Perspectives” and “Exclaim!” open Sept. 17, 2026, 5-8 p.m., at The Whale, 15 43rd Street in Sunset Park. The exhibits will be on display on weekends from 1-6 p.m. through Oct. 18.