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Shift Happens at GreenHill

In Dialogue with Heather Gordon


Heather Gordon, 2019, photo courtesy of Eli Gray

In her drawings, paintings, and installations North Carolina based artist Heather Gordon maps the poetry of life using mathematical elements like numbers and geometry to coax narratives from information related to data of place, time and physical properties. In her collaborative projects she has extended her practice to large scale site-specific installations based on elaborate research, often including sculptural, performance and movement elements which altogether result in multifaceted and thought provoking projects that prompt the visitor’s intellectual and visceral engagement. In this interview Heather Gordon sheds some light on her nine-foot-high site-specific mural on the large exterior window of the GreenHill gallery to be completed late September. Heather Gordon’s public art initiative is the first of a group of works by the artist at GreenHill Center for North Carolina Art, as part of the Shift Happensart installation series which aims to explore art engagement at a time of social distancing.

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Artists on Coping: Simona Prives

During the Coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.


Working on Governors Island during a residency with 4heads, 2019. Photo by Ed Grant

Simona Prives is a Brooklyn-based visual artist. She creates collages, both still and moving, that focus on the process of decomposition and reconstruction and that examine our complex relationship between the organic and the man-made. Each work combines multiple forms of printmaking, using drawing, monotype, found material and hand-shot video to assemble the composition. Her artwork has been exhibited in New York City, Chicago, Miami, Italy, Greece, Japan and China, including at the Shanghai International Print Biennale.

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Artists on Coping: Niki Lederer

During the Coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.


Goldenrod, 2019, Found re-purposed plastic bottles, machine screws, hex nuts, wire, rebar armature, concrete base. Artist with sculpture currently on view at Wolfs Lane Park as part of Pelham Art Center’s Public Art Program.

Niki Lederer is a sculptor working with found materials including discarded umbrellas and post-consumer plastic. Born in London, Ontario and raised in Vancouver, she received her BFA from the University of Victoria and her MFA from Hunter College in New York City. Group exhibitions include Portal: Governors Island, 50 Years of Public Art in NYC Parks, Central Park and the Outdoor Sculpture Biennial Adelphi University, Garden City, NY. Solo exhibitions include Washington Square Windows, NYU and Preset Tense, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto. Niki recently collaborated with XAOC Contemporary Ballet for Norte Maar’s CounterPointe8. Currently her re-purposed plastic bottle sculpture is featured at the Pelham Art Center and Wolfs Lane Park and her discarded-umbrella based work will be included in the Wassaic Project 2020 Summer Exhibition. Niki lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.

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Artists on Coping: Carmen Paulino

During the Coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.

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Photo credit: Michael Paulino 

Carmen Paulino is a visual artist who works on providing community art programming in hospitals, community centers, and senior centers around New York City. Raised in the El Barrio section of New York City, her love for the arts was inspired by the murals in her diverse neighborhood, and her father who performed as a musician in several traditional salsa bands. As a young child, she watched her mother and grandmother knit, crochet, and sew unique traditional quilts and patterns. These experiences inspired her to develop her own techniques and produce her own mixed media works that incorporate her own life experiences, visuals from her immediate surroundings, and the inspiration that comes from living in a diverse melting pot of cultures. Paulino works at the Creative Center of University Settlement House, and in 2019 was artist-in-residence at El Barrio’s Art Space PS 109.

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Artists on Coping: Deanna Lee

During the Coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.

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Deanna Lee was born in Putnam County, New York, to parents from China and Taiwan, and raised in suburban Boston. She grew up spending time in her mother’s biology lab and taking classical music lessons on several instruments for 14 years. Comprising drawings, paintings, site-specific installations, and public artworks, her art interprets everyday traces of transformation in natural systems and the built environment. Numerous venues have shown her work, including Robert Henry Contemporary, Wave Hill, the Drawing Center, and the New York Hall of Science. Among her honors are awards from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, Asia Society, National Academy, Millay Colony, and Saltonstall Foundation. In addition to her visual art practice, Lee is a member of the Balinese ensemble, Gamelan Dharma Swara.

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Artists on Coping: Rhonda Dee

During the Coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.

A person standing in front of a sign

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Photo credit: ZakiP

Rhonda Dee is from Texas and currently resides in Australia. She holds a BFA, (CCA, Seattle), and MA, from Sydney College of the Arts. Her layered works explore the body as a site of transformation between human, animal hybrids and supernatural forces. Her works are in permanent collection at Macquarie University, Australia-China Arts Foundation, and Museu Brasileiro da Escultura, Sao Paulo, Brazil.  Recently, she’s begun creating public artworks with disadvantaged communities. She features in Artist Profile, The Art Life, Torrens University Blog, Arts Hub Australia and is currently designing podcasts with Casula Powerhouse Art Centre, in response to COVID19.

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Artists on Coping: Robin Holder

During the Coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.

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Robin Holder

Robin Holder is a 2020 Clark Hulings Fund For Artists Executive Fellow. Her recent exhibit “Access and Inequities. I Hear You. Do You See Me?” featured works exploring identity conflicts. She has presented one-person exhibitions at the Mobile Museum of Art, The NCCU Art Museum, The Labor Museum, and The Spelman College Museum. She was awarded an Individual Artist Grant by The Brooklyn Arts Council as well as a Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation Artist As Catalyst Residency. Holder has completed 5 public art commissions, and her work is included in significant collections including the Library of Congress and The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

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Artists on Coping: Rosa Valado

During the Coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping

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Rosa Valado, Corona Scroll in progress – home studio during COVID-19 PAUSE; 2020; mixed media and graphite on paper; 16”X120”; photo courtesy of Rosa Valado

Rosa Valado creates immersive installations, multilayered sensory experiences, utilizing diverse approaches, from the smell of burning wax and music to architectural elements and engineering problem solving. Throughout her body of work which includes architectural elements, drawings, paintings, and sculpture, she explores notions of space and time, and elements of light. Valado has created public art projects and been in solo and group exhibitions in Austria, Germany, and Holland, and exhibits regularly in New York City. She has received many grants and fellowships, including a Pollock-Krasner, Sharpe-Walentas, Yaddo, Jerome Foundation, and has been featured in the New York Times, Art Forum, Art in America. Juries and panels include Hamilton College and Jerome Foundation.

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Artists on Coping: Renee Robbins

During the Coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.

Renee Robins in her studio

Renee Robbins is a Chicago-based visual artist who layers biomorphic forms to create detailed otherworldly environments. She has been awarded public art commissions with Chicago Public Art Group, Wabash Arts Corridor, and Illinois’ Art-In-Architecture program. She has exhibited widely, including exhibitions at Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum, Chicago, IL; Lois Lambert Gallery, Santa Monica, CA; Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Batavia, IL; Firecat Projects, Chicago, IL; and the Alden B Dow Museum of Science and Art, Midland, MI. Her work has been featured in the Chicago Gallery News, PBS WTTW, and Ahtcast. Robbins has been working in Chicago for over a decade.

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