Each time that I visit I think about asking them, but it never feels like the right time.

And they don't bring it up.

So I asked my mother.

She said, "Do it now."

But I don't know if I can tell their story.

My name is Hallie Maxwell, and I'm an interdisciplinary artist.

The title of my show is "Alternate Heirlooms."

So I'm thinking about the other things that I received from my family that aren't just physical heirlooms, but the stories that have been passed down to me.

I've been really interested in figuring out how to tell the story of my family - in particular, my family history of my great-grandmothers and my grandparents surviving the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.

With this body of work I became really interested in what I have inherited with the passing of these stories down to me, but then also how that history exists within my own body as well.

Almost all of my direct ancestors survived the atomic bombing except for my great-grandfather.

He was a police officer, so he was in the epicenter making fire breaks at the time that the atom bomb was dropped.

They knew that there was going to be some sort of bombing in the city.

So he sent for my family to go to the outskirts of the city.

So they survived by being just far enough away.

My great-grandmother looked for him the day after the bombing and she couldn't find any of his remains.

So she only gathered some sand in the spot where she believed that he passed away.

So that's all that we have left of him.

And so I've been thinking about, "Where does he exist?"

And he exists with me and within my own body, perhaps in ways that I don't fully recognize yet.

And so I made this work made of mizuhiki cords.

I formed them around my body and then I closed the form and placed it upon this porcelain slip that I painted onto the concrete floor.

My work tends to be very repetitious.

I'm really interested in how by making something over and over again, you are connecting to tradition.

Traditionally this material is used in the process of gift-giving.

The mizuhiki cords are either in white and red or black and white.

Red and white is for more celebratory occasions, where black and white is more mournful and for funerals.

The specific knot, the awaji knot, it symbolizes a wish to be tied to someone forever.

"To protect yourself, you're supposed to go under the desk."

The work "Mama" is purposely a very quiet work.

I see it as kind of a whisper, where it's asking the viewer to engage with it and get low and listen to it.

The sound within the suitcase is interviews with my grandmother.

My grandmother was nine years old at the time, so she was at school when the bomb was dropped, and she remembers it quite vividly.

"Everyone was running, crying and running, you know, to the home."

It's just been an interesting experience to hear this whole story that she's always holding within her.

The work behind me is called "Kuzu," which the title is referencing a vining plant.

It is made of thousands of mizuhiki cords.

I became interested in the idea by Nicolas Bourriaud of the "radicant artist," which a radicant plant is a plant that proliferates through its vines rather than through its roots or through seeds.

Essentially a radicant artist then is one that gets their identity from migration and travel rather than being rooted in one place.

I definitely see myself as sort of a wanderer.

Sometimes it feels like I've been given something that's not mine to hold.

I see myself as a translator of these histories that have been passed down to me.

I've felt a sense of urgency to share their stories.

It's something that I've worked long and hard to have the courage to come forward and be so personal.

I think my work is the most successful when people begin to think about their own personal family histories.

And it sparks those thoughts of, "Oh, I need to reach out to my grandparents.

I need to talk to them.

I need to get their history recorded as well."

So those are the moments that I really enjoy when I share my work.

I'm more interested in that yearning for understanding.