The Lands of Kats Kill is the second in a series of three interrelated experimental pieces that combine graphics, text, and hyperlinks based on themes coming out of my Crazy River project, for which I gave an interview on this website on May 16th. Crazy River takes a wide-angle view of the climate crisis, ranging from my own climate grief to an in-depth focus on the many causes and effects of rapid environmental changes on the West Branch of the Neversink in Ulster County. In this piece I investigate the idea of the Catskills as a region, and an incongruous bundle of contradictions and coincidences. The Lands of Kats Kill weaves three timelines together: the geologic, the historical, and the personal. This structure repeats throughout my Crazy River project. The previous piece in this series, Invaders, took apart the idea of invasive species. The following will explore the concept of the Golden Spike in stratigraphy as fact and metaphor.
Continue reading “The Lands of Kats Kill”Notice: Function WP_Object_Cache::add was called incorrectly. Cache key must not be an empty string. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.1.0.) in /www/artspiel_344/public/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131
Alicia Piller – Weathering Climates
Alicia Piller in her Inglewood studio.
LA based artist Alicia Piller creates multi layered sculptures and installations in which material, media, form, and color metamorphose into alluring environments filled with cultural, political, and biographic references—latex balloons, sycamore seeds, silkscreen images fuse into a cosmos with visually complex and open ended layers of meaning.
Continue reading “Alicia Piller – Weathering Climates”Water Conversations, The Goddess Brigid, and Mayflies
49th Uranium Mining Legacy, Remembrance Day and Action Day, Navajo Nation, Grants Mining Belt, New Mexico, USA, July 12, 2018 .
Irish visual artist and researcher Anna Macleod has spent the last 15 years exploring the environmental, economic, spiritual, political, and scientific aspects of water through interdisciplinary collaborations, performance, public interventions, and socially engaged activism.
Continue reading “Water Conversations, The Goddess Brigid, and Mayflies”GLASSTRESS 2022: State of Mind at Fondazione Berengo Art Space
Art Spiel Photo Story
Jimmie Durham, Untitled (detail), 2020- Photo credit Francesco Allegretto, Courtesy of the artist’s estate (6)
Coinciding with the 59th Venice Biennale, the seventh edition of Glasstress, running from 3 of June to 27 of November 2022 in Venice, features a group of leading contemporary artists from Europe, the United States, Latin America and Africa in an ambitious exhibition who explore the infinite creative possibilities of glass. The artworks will be exhibited at the Fondazione Berengo Art Space in Murano, an old abandoned furnace that was transformed into a unique exhibition space a few years ago. This extensive group show, curated by Adriano Berengo and Koen Vanmechelen with the contribution of Ludovico Pratesi, channels diverse contemporary art through the ancient art of Murano glassblowing, aiming to search for new contemporary visual vocabulary in glass art.
Continue reading “GLASSTRESS 2022: State of Mind at Fondazione Berengo Art Space”Invaders
Feral Hog, 24” x 36”, 2021, Acrylic on Panel. © Hovey Brock
Invaders is the first in a series of three interrelated experimental pieces that combine graphics, text, and hyperlinks based on themes coming out of my Crazy River project, for which I gave an interview on this website on May 16th. Invaders plays with the idea of invasive species, which has to be the misnomer of the century. So-called invasive species do reduce biodiversity in their new ecosystems but they are all the result of human intervention. International trade has been the main agent for transport to new locations, but climate change has also forced many species to move beyond their original habitat in order to survive. Every invasive species does what all living creatures do, including our own: take advantage of opportunities. Invaders includes my Crazy River paintings, photographs, and a list of 100 species from an on-line source: The Global Invasive Species Database, produced by the Invasive Species Specialist Group, a global network of scientists dedicated to identifying and tracking invasives.
Continue reading “Invaders”Artist Kristina Libby and the Village Alliance Welcome New Animal Inspired Public Art Exhibition – In Plain Sight
Grimo, courtesy of the artist and photographer Adam Reich.
Artist Kristina Libby is no stranger to the power of public art: during the onset of COVID, Libby founded the Floral Heart Project. In collaboration with 1-800-Flowers, The Floral Heart Project created and distributed floral heart wreaths as a tribute to those who lost their lives to COVID-19. Moved by community response to the Floral Heart Project, Libby has created a series of large sculptures of apex animals known as the Chunkos. Greenwich Village, a hot-spot for both art and architecture, will play host to the Chunkos in an immersive exhibition titled In Plain Sight (on view from June 10-12). The exhibit is inspired by the unique history of animals in art and architecture in the neighborhood and is a celebration of the resilience, courage and creativity of New Yorkers from all walks of life. On Friday, June 10th, there will be an interactive public art painting exercise with Libby and the Village Alliance Business Improvement District from 5-7pm. She hopes that the installation of the Chunkos in Astor place will spark new conversations and evoke curiosity from passerbys. Curious artists of all ages are welcome to join as she paints in real time with the help of the community the inaugural animals in her Chunkos series.
Continue reading “Artist Kristina Libby and the Village Alliance Welcome New Animal Inspired Public Art Exhibition – In Plain Sight”Nikki Lindt: The Underground Sound Project
Featured Artist
Nikki Lindt recording photo: Joe Klementovich
Artist Nikki Lindt created the interactive pubic artwork titled The Underground Sound Project in collaboration with NYC Parks, USDA Forest Service, the Nature of Cities, and Prospect Park Alliance. It explores the surprising and resonant world of sounds that can be heard underground in environments such as soils, streams, and trees, highlighting collaborations between art and science. The interactive project will be up in Prospect Park starting May14th for a year until May 14th 2023.
Continue reading “Nikki Lindt: The Underground Sound Project”What Happens When an Artist Goes to Eden
Eden in Iraq Wastewater Garden Project (2011-present), site drawing of El Chibaish, 26,250 square meters (6.4 acres, 2.6 hectares), rendering by Bernard Du, 2017)
In 2011, photographer and environmental artist Meridel Rubenstein envisioned creating a garden in southern Iraq where the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers cross, near the supposed site of the biblical Garden of Eden. However, unlike its idyllic predecessor – a mythical paradise in a newly formed world – this new garden would help to heal what had become a fragile, desert wasteland by cleaning existing wastewater and establishing a culturally significant green space.
Continue reading “What Happens When an Artist Goes to Eden”Fragile Rainbow: Traversing Habitats by ecoartspace
Featured Project: with curator Sue Spaid
Tessa Grundon, Invasive Species, 2018-2021/2022, Asiatic Bittersweet root systems and border fencing, dimensions variable.
The group show Fragile Rainbow: Traversing Habitats at the Williamsburg Art and Historical Center in Brooklyn includes paintings, sculptures, videos, and installations addressing environmental issues by more than fifty artists from the New York City region who are members of ecoartspace. The title is based on Claire McConaughy’s oil painting, Fragile Rainbow, referencing both hope and loss. The show runs from May 7th through June 4th, 2022. Curator Sue Spaid elaborates on this large-scale group show.
Continue reading “Fragile Rainbow: Traversing Habitats by ecoartspace”Hovey Brock: Crazy River
In Dialogue with Hovey Brock
Hovey Brock at work on Crazy River, 2019, acrylic on panel, 30” x 40,” a work from his Crazy River series.
Hovey Brock’s current paintings are part of Crazy River, a larger project he has been developing since 2017. The paintings are based on his life-long relationship to the West Branch of the Neversink, which runs between Ulster and Sullivan counties in New York state. The project also includes text and videos, drawing on the artist’s experience and stories about the West Branch and the western Catskill mountains handed down through his family.
Continue reading “Hovey Brock: Crazy River”