To recall six foot waves, meadows, tidal surges, eight inch oysters that this was the land that the Gowanus canal replaced. Fortunately, we now have human creativity surging through this area of Brooklyn.
For my part in the Gowanus Open Studios 2019, one of my works is of a man reaching with his hand to feel the softness of a meadow plant. I will display this palladium print on Japanese gampi paper and a few other works as part of GOS2019 on the weekend of October 19th and 20th, from noon to 6 PM.
The location is King Killer Studio, 69 Second Ave. near 9th Street in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn.
The link to all the artists exhibiting is https://www.artsgowanus.org.
(Nature in) Lockdown Exhibition
I am honored to exhibit two series of works, ‘Blossoms of an Oak Tree’ and ‘Ocean Totems’ in the online exhibition https://fayddigital.com/Nature-in-lockdownat fayddigital.com Magazine, working at the intersection of art, design and the environment. This exhibition has been curated by Yingbi Lee and Maryam Arshad.
During lockdown, I took daily walks in Prospect Park, Brooklyn. As a result, I developed a sensitivity to walking on earth and climbing over tree roots. This urban park is my refuge and I walked in rain as well as sunny days. After a windy rain storm, I noticed for the first time how trees blossom in the spring because I found blossoms of a large oak tree on the ground. The delicacy of these newly sprouted blossoms and yellow green leaves amazed me.
I applied my camera-less photography techniques to these blossoms to make 16X20 inch negatives. Brushing the palladium solution onto the transparent gampi paper and exposing the negatives with the sun helped me to express the vibrancy of the oak blossoms.
I made the collage, ‘Breath’, to equate the first breath of a baby with blossoming oak leaves. I printed multiple negatives in layers and painted with pearlescent watercolors. By having the baby and the Oak blossoms in the same work I seek to show our interdependence with trees. We need oxygen. Trees transform carbon dioxide through photosynthesis to produce oxygen.
Act Natural
Act Natural is an online Berlin Collectiv group exhibition, May 20 through June 18, 2022 featuring art work related to the natural world.
“The secret of the human condition is that there is no equilibrium between humans and the surrounding forces of nature, which infinitely exceed us when we remain in inaction; there is only equilibrium in action by which humans recreate our own life through work.”
-Simone Weil, “Gravity and Grace”
Act Natural explores the themes of perception, connection and acceptance of the natural world in which we inherently exist and act upon. Many artists in this exhibition find grace through their work in what is traditionally perceived as a conflict between humans and nature. Philosopher Alan Watts clarifies our position: “You didn’t come in this world. You came out of it, like a wave from the ocean.”
The artists in this fine art exhibition are Nicole Cohen, Martha Colburn, Valerie Fuchs, Alice Garik, Gwen Kerber, Paul Paiement and Stephen Wozniak. Stephen Wozniak curated the exhibition.
While the work of participating artists in “Act Natural” may appear different upon cursory glance, there are numerous formal overlaps that indicate each artist’s desire to create deliberate, necessary and ostensibly rich aesthetic elements that point to the poetry of their preferred themes: visual perception, subjective experience, human creativity, and nature at large.
In 2022, now in the throes of political unrest, loss of life, systemic discrimination, a worldwide pandemic, economic upheaval, and eroding self worth, it is imperative to provide new work that helps fine art audiences to connect with the natural world, reset their lives, redefine their value, resolve our nominal differences and reclaim the place we call home on earth.
I believe that this online exhibition will help by presenting the works of “Act Natural” to a diverse audience that seeks personal healing, a reconnection to the natural world, community unification and movement forward.
“Vital Impetus” Art Exhibit
My artwork in the form of palladium prints is on exhibit. This exhibition has been curated by Azure Arts and the dates are February 23, 2023 to March 13, 2023. The venue is located at 5 Rivington Street in Manhattan. My work is in correspondence with two other artists who address the theme of “Vital Impetus”.
“Vital impetus” derives from the concept of “elan vital” , a term coined by the French philosopher Henri Bergson. Rather than simply adhering to a set of mechanistic laws, Bergson contended that life has an inherent drive or impulse towards creativity, growth and innovation. While his philosophy emphasizes the role of individual experience, consciousness and creativity, he also saw the ‘self’ as fundamentally connected to others. The ‘self’ for Bergson, stands in dynamic relation to others. The ‘self’ is evolving constantly through its interactions with others.
In my artworks on exhibit, the human body is explored as a site for construction and communication of identity. Tattoos are vehicles for merging our human experiences with the larger world. By culling images from mythology, artifacts, and flora and fauna, my work explores the vital connections between self and other.
The Good Luck Dragon
A tattooed SERPENT-DRAGON rests on a nest of twigs. The twigs symbolize the microbial ecosystem we live in and that our bodies extend beyond our skin. Another serpent-dragon grows ROOTS like a tree which symbolize our ability to be rooted. Dandelion seeds disperse and fly as if they had wings intersecting another tattooed serpent-dragon to symbolize our ability to CREATE and nurture.
Lunar New Year 2024 will be the year of the Wood Dragon. The dragon is the only mythic animal in the Chinese Zodiac. It is associated with good luck, health, abundance, and strength. The element of wood is one of the five elements that constitute human and ecological health in traditional acupuncture. My own beliefs about our embeddedness in nature are reinforced by these theories and insights. The wood element is easily seen in trees where their rooted trunks expand with their branches. Extending these thoughts to our own health and well being, the Wood Dragon is about our own rootedness and our abilities to expand and grow.
are fifteen of my unique palladium prints. That the black and white palladium prints are in Taos is significant because in Zuni culture the use of black and white in their pottery represents the upper world. The featured print here of her hands crossed in a flight movement with her bird tattoo relates to the world of spirit.
My palladium prints are handmade using the traditional analogue darkroom techniques of making negatives, either camera-less or photographs with a 4X5 large format camera. Brushing palladium on handmade Japanese gampi, I layer my negatives and expose them using the sun. The resulting montage is spontaneous and suggests movement with the images embedded in a paper with the tactility of silk.
Art and Poetry
When in the Gulf of Maine the sea ebbs, the seaweed named Irish moss is revealed. Irish moss cushions living things in layers. Rachel Carson describes this as “life exists on other life, or within it, or under it, or above it” in her book “The Edge of the Sea”.
At Arts Gowanus Open Studios, October 19 and 20, noon to 6 PM, 69 Second Ave., Brooklyn, I will display this camera-less, palladium print in collaboration with this poem by poet Diane Mehta.
