Gary Snyder’s private collection: February 2019

“ Ode to Mt. Tam & Gary Snyder : Cabin Fever”

The 3D poetic canvas created from walking Mt. Tam behind the footsteps of Gary Snyder has been added to the poet´s private collection.  It will eventually be part of the literary archive housed at the Special Collections Department of the Library at U C Davis.  His publisher, Jack Shoemaker relayed Mr. Gary Snyder´s gratitude for the art. 

“Mr Snyder is grateful for your work. Thank you for sharing this beautiful piece. I will send it along to Mr. Snyder.”

Jack Shoemaker, publisher.

Poet Gary Snyder in Berkeley with “Ode to Mt. Tam & Gary Snyder: Cabin Fever”

Poet Gary Snyder in Berkeley with “Ode to Mt. Tam & Gary Snyder: Cabin Fever”

MoMA: Exhibit New York January 2018

In the Studio: Art by MoMA's Online Learning Community

"Machado's Alamo"

Exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art, in the The Lewis B. and Dorothy Cullman Education and Research Building at 4 West 54 Street, New York, NY, USA 10

January 5-22, 2018

In the Studio: Art by MoMA’s Online Learning Community features images of artworks created by students in MoMA’s online course In the Studio: Postwar Abstract Painting, alongside instructor Corey D’Augustine’s In the Studio demonstration videos. The exhibition celebrates the creativity of MoMA’s global community of online learners, who explore the materials and techniques of postwar abstract painters through their own artworks—as well as, in some cases, interpreting them into other mediums and updating them using digital tools.  Published on-line at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YRhkztQW3A&list=PLfYVzk0sNiGF3EyhI4Kt2-8QxMiQpgxTy&index=4

 

SFMOMA: Digital Exhibit

SF MOMA: Digital Exhibit April 6-July 2, 2017

“Ode to Mt. Tam & Gary Snyder”

Unauthorized SFMOMA Show was a series of solo shows that took place from April 6th - July 2nd, which could only be seen and experienced if the viewer was physically present at SFMOMA's public spaces, specifically the areas where visitors did not have to pay the $25 admission fee: the entrance and the lobby of the museum. Visitors could browse to http://sfmoma.show on their mobile devices and, after geolocation verification, see works in the current Unauthorized SFMOMA Show.

At the visitor's fingertips were solo exhibitions happening on a rotating basis, submitted by artists from all around the world for the audience present at SFMOMA's premises. The walls of these virtual exhibitions were the screens of the visitors' devices (smart phones, tablets and computers); mobile, individual, personal and unstable surfaces that could switch to something else in a matter of seconds.

Unauthorized SFMOMA Show was equally dynamic: without an exhibition program planned in advance and totally dependent on the participation of artists and visitors, it showcased a total of 722 solo exhibitions, one at a time. It was totally free of charge and censorship, and regardless of the submitter's physical location. 

Ode to Mt. Tam & Gary Snyder Cabin Fever.png

Machado 100 year anniversary workshop/installation

 

 Caminante, son tus huellas

el camino, y nada más;

caminante, no hay camino,

se hace camino al andar.

Antonio Machado

 

Se hace camino al andar

 “Caminante, no hay camino,/ se hace camino al andar” son versos de Antonio Machado, publicados hace 100 años en la segunda edición de Campos de Castilla (1917-2017).

 Con esa filosofía machadiana, la Exposición/Taller “Se hace camino al andar”, organizada por la Fundación Antonio Machado (FAM), en el marco de la Exposición, I Premio Antonio Machado, y Foro, Machado y la Naturaleza, invita a los alumnos y las alumnas de Soria a participar, de manera interactiva, el día 1 de Diciembre de 2017, de 9,00 a 14,00 horas, en el Instituto Antonio Machado de Soria.

Por una parte, escribiremos, con tiza, en homenaje al profesor Antonio Machado, sobre tejas, a modo de camino, versos de su libro Campos de Castilla. Y, por otro parte, pintaremos telas con los colores del paisaje de Soria, que recorrí yo misma un día, siguiendo el enfoque táctil de la filosofía de Maurice Merleau-Ponty y María Zambrano.

Ambas actividades son la razón poética de mis impresiones sorianas sobre su paisaje y su caminar, sabio y digno, como escribiría el poeta soriano, Antonio Machado. El trabajo realizado durante el taller educativo permanecerá expuesto en el Instituto Antonio Machado.

Soria, Spain.

Source: http://fundacionantoniomachado.blogspot.co...

Design Centre, UK 2017

The Design Centre and W. A. L. K. Research Centre at University of Sunderland hosted my solo interactive installation of the 3D Poetic Canvas based on the poems of Wordsworth, Whitman, Machado and Snyder and my walks in their inspirational landscapes. 

I was artist and curator for this solo multi-media show with the guidance of Prof. Manny Ling and Prof. Mike Collier.

The four walking poets were presented with the sacred number 33 to allow for a walking experience on par with the Buddhist-Hindu traditional mandala that potentially focuses the mind and body in harmony with its environment. 

Personally I wanted to allow for the emergence of a creative space via walking combined with fragments of Nature to inspire the audience. 

The Sacred number 33 is derived from 8 directions (compass) + 3 dimensions (sky, earth, inner core) X 3 (time) = 33.  Past, present and future merge into One.  In context the 8 landscape palette colours X 4 poets (32) +1 (artist) = 33. 

Several challenges were presented with the space and heritage material such as a static centre wall, treatment of delicate 100 year-old tiles, and the 32 painted landscape banners in a low ceiling.  I opted for a Tibetan flag effect and created special hangers for the tiles to maintain integrity for the show, while positioning the centre wall on a diagonal to open the space for a circular path.

I added my re-play poetry and painted palettes based on my walks in the Lakes District of England (Mt. Helvellyn), Mt. Tamalpais near San Francisco, Hempstead Plains on Long Island, New York, and Guadarrama Mountains in Spain. 

The banners were hand-stitched with cotton thread and/or glued with canvas to adhere to the concept of bookbinding. 

This year marks the 100th anniversary of Machado’s poetic stanza, "Caminante no hay camino" first published in Campos de Castilla, second edition 1917.  This is the first exhibit in a series across two continents: Europe and the Americas.

 

The name “Touch and Be Touched” is derived from one of my older poems about the relationship between the drummer and the drum in African music.

This exhibit displays the phenomenological aspect of my research in tactile perception and how we understand the world outside ourselves via “touch.”

In addition, it is rare to touch a roof tile (on the floor) considering its placement high above our reach in real life, which focuses our attention on its visual perception.

The public was invited to participate in touching various parts of the exhibit as an added element to the visual perception.  Tables provided access to the physically challenged and the floor replicated a sandbox. 

Furthermore, the audience could walk around the space and create a personalized 3D poetic canvas within the tactile exhibit.  Various combinations arose with literary context and forms that transformed the installation each day. 

Everything was touchable with a core hanging section which remained stable to help balance out the changes.  I was able to witness some of the public response from art and design students who enjoyed the playful aspect of forms.  Surprisingly the Spanish and English poetic fragments at times matched noting the “blue” sky.  I believe this was pure coincidence but at the same time quite beautifully displayed. 

The exhibit ended up with its own path on a “walk” into our collective tactile memory.  The impermanence of each 3D poetic canvas was part of the Buddhist philosophy to enjoy the present.

 

Thanks to the collaboration of the technicians in the Art, Design and Media department I was able to further advance my PhD research in museum presentation.

Additionally my student colleagues (including Jo and Angela) were encouraging and special thanks to Richie and Zack for their expertise in metal and photography respectively.

Featured
Forest Flaneur NEW Workshop France.JPEG.jpg
Forest Flaneur Workshop- Mont-Blanc, France (Chamonix).
Snyder and Cabin Fever NEW.jpg
Gary Snyder’s private collection: February 2019
IMG_8800 Poster.JPG
MoMA: Exhibit New York January 2018
Ode to Mt. Tam & Gary Snyder Cabin Fever.png
SFMOMA: Digital Exhibit
Machado 100 year anniversary workshop/installation
Machado 100 year anniversary workshop/installation
Solo show Sunderland phone exhibit March 2017 059.jpg
Design Centre, UK 2017
GZBasel NEW Exhibit 2016 173.jpg
Images GZ BASEL
Basel 2016, Switzerland
Coming Soon

Images GZ BASEL

Interactive exhibit

Basel 2016, Switzerland

GZ BASEL June 15-19

Basel, Switzerland

The Gallery Zero, Barcelona (GZ) invited me to exhibit in its collective art fair.  It was a side line event of ART BASEL.  Artists from all over the world participated in performance, visual, and video arts.  From as far away as the Kingdom of Tonga came Uili Louisi and Satchi and Satchi collection Alexandria Howlownia.  Outstanding performances by Ursula San Cristobal and Eleni Mylona peaked our social interest in gender issues and the Greek tragedy of today. 

My exhibit was interactive inviting the public to participate and use the blank tiles to write their additions to the 3D poetic canvas.  French, English, Spanish and German public members delved into the art of writing their own ideas and at the same time re-arrange the installation to their own design.  The middle tile was constant “I am the Self.” 

Review

“The experiencing of landscape - whether from aesthetic, economic, metaphysical, political, or virtual perspectives -has always been labyrinthine. A labyrinth we have to navigate if we want to know what our relationship with nature is.

Ms. Ruiz-Scarfuto's landscapes created under the wild pines of Valsain, Spain and Helvelyn's Striding Edge, UK are intimate and expansive, inviting endless magnification while, simultaneously, suffusing beyond the frame. Somewhere in this disorientating zooming in and out is the human perspective. The same perspective as impressionism offers, in its least representational manifestation, where everything is subsumed to the human eye, and therefore to individual experience. 

The central role of the human experience is always present, as in the Zen garden-like collocation of terracotta and slate roof tiles on swatches of painted fabric, as objects allowed to interact under patterns of randomness, the happy accidents of Buddhist thinking, which are meaningless without people to witness them.”