It’s not hard to get inspired about nature, the ocean and all its amazing creatures when you visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I’ve been many times but hadn’t been there in many years and it was such a good reminder of was an incredible resource it is and it’s less than an hour away from my studio.
While the swaying kelp forests and swirling anchovy tanks are reliably hypnotic, they just opened their newest exhibition Into the Deep, which showcases the strangest of creatures from the depths of the ocean floor. The Japanese Spider Crabs were so gigantic, they almost looked fake and the Basket Starfish is otherworldly. But really, I can’t stop watching this video I took of a bloody belly comb jelly, it’s only red when spotlit since the red light spectrum is gone at that depth allowing it to hide in plain site….nature is the best artist.
A few things are going on in the studio these days…
All of these Bone Series parts will be going towards two different exhibits, one is a public art piece for a wall installation at a new health care building in Santa Cruz and the rest (plus many more) will be used on a site specific installation at an exhibition at UCSC’s Eloise Pickard Smith Gallery this fall.
I love how parts sitting around the studio catching the morning light can be just as beautiful as any planned installation I might create. The shadows become just as important at the pieces themselves and it makes you see the pieces in a whole new way.
In additions to all the porcelain Bone Series parts, the big Umbels came back into the studio from their showing in the This is the Anthropocene exhibit and now I’m working on designing stems for them so they can be displayed at Sierra Azul’s sculpture garden as part of Sculpture IS: 2022. It will be fun to see these guys up off the ground and outside.
And on the side, I’m also running some experiments with fusing glass in the kiln. If you’ve seen my resin pieces with the porcelain parts embedded in them, the plan is the same with these pieces but using glass instead of resin. It will be a challenge to get them to be successful but I’m excited about the idea of using a material that isn’t plastic while still getting a similar layered effect with glass… we will see what happens here…fingers crossed!
I went up to Eloise Pickard Smith Gallery this week with curator Tauna Coulson to see the gallery space and toss around ideas for my upcoming exhibition there this fall. It’s a beautiful space nestled into the redwoods that I hadn’t been to a million years. As a bonus, I got to see the current exhibition on display.
Warp & Weft is about how textiles are integral in our lives, yet often overlooked. The exhibit showcases nine artists work with themes of family, community and politics through weaving and the history of cloth. Here are a few images I took of the show…
I know the parking is awful, but they are open Thursday nights until 7 and on Saturdays 12-5, so if you get a chance get up there and check it out!
I’ve been spending a lot more time in the water these days…it’s freezing but also exhilarating, I always feel better after a swim, as if the whole day can be reset by a good dunking. Swimming has always been a place of meditation for me, and water has always been an inspiration. Lately, I’ve been diving deeper (pun not intended!) into the science of water; reading more, learning more and thinking more about all the ways we encounter water. How we take its resource for granted, how we live in the subtle balance of having too much or too little water, how our bodies literally 60% water and really paying attention to what’s below the surface.
These images below are of radiolarian skeletons under an electron microscope, radiolarians are single cell planktons that live in all oceans, they trap carbon from the atmosphere and make up the majority of siliceous ooze at the bottom of the deep oceans. I’ve been fascinated by their complex forms for a long time and have based many works of art around these forms.
Over the coming months, I’ll be working on a number of new pieces using these as inspiration working towards an exhibition at Smith Gallery on the UCSC campus. I’m most excited that through the university, I will be partnering up with professors and students who are studying these creatures, their impact on the larger animals of the ocean, climate change and how we are all connected. I can’t wait to geek out on the science side of all this and use my art as the vehicle to share that knowledge in the upcoming exhibition. I am inspired.
If you missed seeing this show in person, here’s your chance to check out the exhibit with a full gallery tour of This is the Anthropocene, which included works by Cynthia Siegel, Shannon Sullivan, Jenni Ward, Susan Whitmore & Wesley Wright. If you want to learn more about each of the artists work and the curator’s vision for the show, see below…
Curators Statement:
The Anthropocene is defined as the current geological age during which human activity has been the dominant influence on the climate and the environment. Curators Cynthia Siegel and Jenni Ward chose to bring together a diverse group of artists whose work has not been grouped together before to explore this concept. The five artists are responding within the themes of Animal, Agriculture, Landscape, Water and Atmosphere, from multiple viewpoints. Using their current bodies of work, the artists have challenged themselves to deepen their consideration of these relevant topics.
While diverse in style and approach, the artists find commonality in the medium of ceramics, with each artist’s inspiration from nature, and with their desire to use their work to bring awareness to the planet’s current state of peril.
For tens of thousands of years, humans have used the abundant earth resource, clay, to increase their chances of survival. From primitive vessels to applications within the high tech industry, clay has paralleled human development and advancement. This shared history makes ceramics a uniquely relevant medium of expression for this exhibition. Each artist uses this humble medium to reveal a unique point of view regarding the impact of the Anthropocene.
As a parallel to the human struggle for survival, Cynthia Siegel is drawn to the tenacity of the bristlecone pine trees that have endured for thousands of years, both because of and despite their fragile environment. With textured surfaces that reflect the intersection of time, weather, growth, and decay, Siegel’s sculptures convey the inseparability of man and nature.
Using aerial and microscopic imagery as a point of interpretive departure, Shannon Sullivan explores human intervention in the landscape. Patterns found in agricultural landscapes, shifting geologic boundaries, and migrating oceanic phenomena intermingle in her work.
Through her abstract umbel flower installations, Jenni Ward’s work speaks about the disconnection that we have with nature, the unsustainability of monoculture farming, as well as the global issue of food insecurity.
Aspects of attraction and repulsion influence much of the work of Susan Whitmore, who regards light variations and magnifications, varied textures and colors, and the creatures that inhabit the depths, as inspirational and sometimes frightening. Whitmore explores how changing our actions will enable the planet to provide a hospitable existence for all species.
The ornate surfaces of Wesley Wright’s contemplative and noble animals respond to mass extinctions and recent losses of terrestrial and aquatic habitats, yet they also portray species interconnectedness and the hope for continued survival. Some of Wright’s sculptures hold an environment within a glass dome on its body, creating an alternate world of protection and safety.
Each of the artists included in This Is The Anthropocene has a keen interest in understanding and interpreting the inner workings and the wonder they find in their everyday life as a part of the natural world. Driven by personal experience, they have created works for contemplation and discussion, empowering the viewer to consider and even question their own relationship with nature and our changing planet.
Recently reorganizing files led me to going through some vintage works and also made me realize that I’ve been taking my art out into nature for nearly ten years now. A sense of place and belonging to that place has become so much a part of the work and my installations, that I don’t think about the work without thinking about these places, even through the connections are as ephemeral as a shadow.
In the beginning there were experiments, some that were more successful than others. Some work didn’t connect with the space as well as others, it took some paying attention to the spaces and the work that was naturally coming out of the studio to find those connections. To figure out which pieces were more terrestrial and which more aquatic, but it felt that somehow the circle was complete by placing these pieces back where their original inspiration began, like returning the clay to the earth.
When I’ve encountered other people during the placement of these pieces, they always assume that I found the work growing or washed up or reveled somehow and wonder what anomaly of nature they are – so I guess they do look like they belong there. Below are some early images from the start of this process. If you want to check out some more images and newer ‘in the field’ installations, click here. There will be more to come in the future, I don’t see me stopping this part of my creative process any time soon… enjoy.
Nest Series in the Stone Pools in Nisene Marks State Park Aptos California | 2013
Hive Series Manresa State Beach Watsonville California | 2013
Bone Series Fragments | Purple Sand Beach Big Sur California | 2014
I’ve been quietly working away on these pieces in the studio over the past few months and just finished them up. I’m excited to announce that they have been placed with Aerena Galleries in Napa/Sonoma. It was a fun project to collaborate with them on, as they supplied the cloches and I designed the inner compositions with pieces from the Bone Series | Urchins and Medusas. They also have a bit of dried seaweed as part of the compositions, adding texture and color. I’m really pleased with the amount of movement and energy the pieces have despite their containment in the glass.
It will be interesting to see how they will display them in the gallery and even more interesting to see where these strange specimens end up!
Three days and viewing almost 40 exhibitions is definitely pushing my limits of creative absorption but I’m honestly so amazed by the diversity of ways that artists use this humble medium of clay. From hand-built functional ware to high tech 3D printing, artists are really doing just about anything and everything with it and it’s so, so impressive.
From Ground to Surface at Sacramento Fine Arts Center & Constructed Landscapes- Brick, Tile and Pillar at Blue Line Arts
I ended my conference with a first time visit to the Crocker Museum which hosted the NCECA Annual Exhibition Belonging, and enjoyed the permanent collection on display. Their collection was vast and displayed beautifully…I loved seeing their collection of Stephen deStabler works since I took a workshop with him the year that I moved to California, and their Japanese ceramics collection was stunning as well. I also included one image below of a Ruth Asawa crocheted copper piece which is technically not clay but I love her work so much, I had to include it as one of the highlights of this art adventure.
Beneath the Surface-Origin Stories at The MACC: , Belonging and Permanent Collection at the Crocker Art Museum & Body Image at E Street Gallery
And with way too much art swirling in my brain, that’s a wrap NCECA 2022…
So grateful for the opportunity to work with this dream team! Marisa Sayago-Professor of Art at Folsom Lake College + Artists Shannon Sullivan, Jenni Ward, Cynthia Siegel, Susan Whitmore & Wesley Wright
I spent half of today in the conference center watching a few lectures, the morning keynote speech and half the day walking around to exhibits that were close by downtown Sacramento. The keynote was a fascinating talk by Courtney M Leonard who discussed her relationship with her ancestral lands, the surrounding waters and how her ceramic works are responses to that relationship. I ended a very long day at our exhibit ‘This is the Anthropocene’ in Folsom with our artists reception. I really didn’t know if anyone was going to make it that far out of Sacramento to see our show, but we had a busy attendance all evening with lots of words of support and praise. Big thank yous to everyone who came out for our show!
‘Fertile Exchange’ at Delta Conveyance Design and Construction Authority
Legends and Legions: A survey show of California wood firing at Alpha Fired Arts
Seismic State: California Ceramics at Sparrow Gallery
This is the Anthropocene at The Harris Center for the Arts | Bank of America Gallery
