Times Square Arts & ART on the MART PRESENT
Build Up the House II

On View MARCH 1-March 31, 2025

Times Square | Billboards Between Broadway and 7th Avenue, 41st and 49th Streets, New York
On View Nightly, from 11:57PM-12AM

Times Square Arts, the largest public platform for contemporary performance and visual arts, is pleased to announce their Midnight Moment Spring Season featuring Build up the House II by multidisciplinary artist Brendan Fernandes, presented in partnership with ART on THE MART.

Midnight Moment is the world’s largest, longest-running digital art exhibition, synchronized on over 92 electronic billboards throughout Times Square nightly from 11:57pm to midnight. The Spring 2025 program showcases video works that employ the body and movement to pay tribute to intersecting cultural histories and enact Indigenous technologies. 

Combining silhouettes of dancers that leap, spin and vogue across vibrant, pulsing compositions inspired by the artist’s East African heritage, Build up the House II exists at the intersection of visual art, performance and architecture that has characterized Fernandes’ work more broadly. The brightly colored patterns and rhythms of the dancers pay homage to house music by honoring the genre’s queer and POC roots, along with its legacy of providing spaces of safe haven, creative expression and solidarity for those communities since the late 1970s. 

As a communal celebration of identity through dance and assembly, Build Up the House II mirrors the broader spirit of Times Square itself, a gathering place for New Yorkers and visitors from all over the world, one that generates a spectacular and ever-changing choreography of people, lights and moving images. "Times Square is a public space saturated with the semiotics of capital and commerce,” said Fernandes. “Having the opportunity to take over and intervene within this space has allowed me to create a transformative public experience—one where people gather and respond to the flashes, actions and gestures of my animation. My goal is to create a space of celebration and joy, where movement and communal gathering become acts of unity and resilience. This work is a homage to my cultural identity and to queer and POC communities, affirming that through dance and shared space we can foster connection and collective presence."

Though currently based in Chicago, Fernandes was originally born in Nairobi and eventually immigrated to Canada and then the United States via New York City. He incorporates all of his lived experiences into his practice, with a particular focus on themes of race, migration and movement. Build Up the House II is a monumental mark of the artist’s efforts to merge new and historical narratives within a unified expression of dance, heritage and communal renewal both on the screen and in the streets.

The original iteration of this work, Build Up the House, was commissioned by ART on THE MART and presented in fall of 2024 with an accompanying house music soundscape by Chicago-based producer Sean J. Wright.

Project Credits
Build Up The House II: Brendan Fernandes
Original Music for ART on THE MART: Shaun J. Wright
Produced by: Domenic Del Carmine
Dancer: Katlin Michael Bourgeois
Dancer: Lieana Sherry
Animation & Production: Daily Planet Productions, Ltd.
Animator: Tim Berthiaume
Animator: Mike Pindara
Animator: JC Tecklenburg

Support for Midnight Moment is provided in part by the National Endowment for the Arts; the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature; public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council; and the Times Square Advertising Coalition, with additional in-kind support from the Times Square EDITION Hotel. Midnight Moment is made possible by the Times Square Advertising Coalition, ABC SuperSign, American Eagle, Big Outdoor, Branded Cities, Clear Channel, Coca-Cola, Diversified, Express, Heritage Outdoor Media, Levi's, LG, Line Friends, McDonald's, Microsoft, Midtown Financial, Morgan Stanley, New Tradition, Outfront, Paramount, Prudential, Sensory Interactive, Sephora, Sherwood Equities, Show + Tell, Silvercast, Swatch, TSX and T-Mobile.