Over and Under at Wheaton College

Last Thursday was the finale of my tenure as a Visiting Artist at Wheaton College. The project Over and Under: Weaving Together the Fabric of Our Community was a semester long collaboration where student groups and faculty worked together on a large scaffold weave. Individuals donated personal items to be woven into the tapestry resulting in a final collage of colorful individuals coming together as a whole.

The large scaffold weave was designed to be portable and was installed at either in the Balfour Center or the new Science Center cafe area. This increased the visibility and accessibility to many different student groups.

 We removed the weave from the frame and installed it between the two balconies in the student center. It will remain there until graduation. A beautiful emblem to the spirit of Wheaton!

Over and Under

 

 Over and Under: 
Weaving Together the Fabric of our Community

Today was the first of 6 community weaving events at Wheaton College in Norton MA. As part of a program sponsored by the Marshall Center for Intercultural Learning, students are invited to participate in creating a collaborative tapestry. 

We constructed a scaffold weave in between two poles that measures approximately 6 x 16 ft. It will be moved around to several campus locations over the course of the 2014 spring semester. Instruction was provided on how to prepare the materials. Everything from flags, to athletic towels, to pinstripe was cut into strips and woven.

Today we occupied the Belfour-Hood Student Center. In the coming months we'll move to the Mars Center for Science and Technology among other places.

Accompanied by music and free candy, each person had a relaxed time sharing their uniqueness and learning about others. The event garnered a lot of attention as many stopped by on their way to class or coming from picking up their mail. Our next meeting will happen again at the student center on Tuesday evening, February 25 from 5-7 pm. This time there'll be free pizza too!

It's a great benefit to have an installation over an extended period of time like this. The project has the space to grow over the expanse of a couple of months more than it can in a single afternoon. Everyone left today with lots of plans for the next time. And student facilitators will be working with interested parties to teach them how to have their materials ready to go - more time for socializing!

The Order of the Universe

INDEX installed at Beard & Weil Galleries, Wheaton College

Installations evolve each time they exhibit and INDEX is no exception. This iteration includes 25 more objects for a total of 198 with 35 of them being new for this show. They are hung closer together and tower feet over the heads of viewers. This arrangement creates an immersive environment that wraps around the viewer's space when they are standing in front of it. I like it, and will push the size and number even more in the future. 

  

This version's additions include a Betta fish, microscope, baby doll head, balloon, pez container, embroidery hoop, monarch butterfly, bubblewrap etc etc. The tags aren't always within reading distance but the point is made with those that are. The students seem to be having fun playing with order/disorder and the powers of association.

Just down the hall from INDEX sits YARNS in its celestial glow... video running on tablet to the left to give context: 

Yarns is made from skeins of yarn that were forgotten about for decades and found in an attic. Winding from the core out with color on color, almost as performance art until as large as a celestial body. A tribute to the life work of Colella’s mother, Yarns records a shared visual language and serves as an icon for disclosure, loss and consolidation.

And 3 more additions to the IMPOSTERS, an asian spoon, clothespin and flat head screwdriver (not shown).

I'm honored to be in the company of Marina Zurkow, Andi Sutton and Julie Kumar. Here's a sample of their work in this exhibit:

Crossing multiple disciplines with her practice, Marina Zurkow (NY) builds animations and participatory environments that are centered on humans and their relationship to animals, plants and the weather. Engaging audiences using film and video, sculpture, print graphics and public interventions, Zurkow’s work is by turns humorous and contemplative.

Andi Sutton is a Boston-based artist whose practice explores the ways that performance art methodology can create new models for community development and social engagement.  Sutton’s Gardens of the Future: Conversation in Memorial is a room-size installation that invites visitors to enter and contemplate questions about extinction, human impact on the environment, categorization, and more.

Julie Kumar’s (NY) work explores systems, rule structures, and self-organization. She creates compositions in time with computer programs, builds immersive environments that are activated by projected light, and intervenes on materials that erode, drip, melt, evaporate, break apart, or float away. She continuously structures and re-structures systems to allow unforeseen experiences to reveal complex underpinnings behind phenomena and new perceptions of the material world.

October 16-December 13, 2013

Beard & Weil Galleries

Watson Fine Arts, Wheaton College

Artist Talk by Andi Sutton - Nov. 5, 6:30 pm

Artist Talk by Marina Zurkow - Nov. 18, 6:30 pm

Germinating the Universe

One of the perks of what I do is that I have opportunities to meet people who are thinking about, and realizing some very innovative projects.
These two shows are no exception. I cannot wait for the receptions and artist talks to learn even more.  I am honored to be a participant in each of these new and exciting exhibitions.

 

GERMINATION

Six Artists at Gaining Ground – Monika Andersson, Liz Awalt, Jodi Colella, Ilana Manolson, Sarah Purgus, Kathleen Volp

Gaining Ground is an organic farm in Concord, Massachusetts that grows produce and gives it away, for free, to local hunger relief agencies. Six artists, inspired by the beauty of the farm and its mission, will show paintings, photographs and sculpture. At least 20% of all sales will be donated to Gaining Ground.

Exhibition Dates: October 1–31
Reception: Thursday, October 10, 5:30–7:30 pm
Concord Public Library
129 Main Street, Concord, MA

 

 ORDER OF THE UNIVERSE  

Artists Employ Scientific Classification  

Order of the Universe is the second in a series of four exhibitions at Beard & Weil Galleries exploring connections between science and art, this one focused on the classification systems and taxonomies both artists and scientists often use in their work.  Order of the Universe will open on October 17 and will feature the work of four artists: Marina Zurkow, Andi Sutton, Julie Kumar, and Jodi Colella. The exhibition will include sculpture, installation, video, printmaking, and more. 

Exhibition Dates: October 17-December 13
Reception: Thursday, October 17, 6–8 pm

Artist's Slide Talk by Andi Sutton

Tues., November 5 at 6:30

Ellison Lecture hall, Watson Fine Arts

Artist's Slide Talk by Marina Zurkow

Mon., November 18 at 6:30

Ellison Lecture hall, Watson Fine Arts 

Beard & Weil Galleries

Wheaton College