Group Exhibitions

H20 – Preview: Ruth Wallen

This post comes to you from Green Public Art

On May 6, 2011, H20: The Art of Conservation, at the Water Conservation Garden, San Diego, CA, will open to the public. Green Public Art reviewed over 1100 artists portfolios before inviting 14 San Diego artists to participate in the exhibition which offers San Diego homeowners an artistic alternative to incorporate water conservation into their own garden spaces. Green Public Art awarded each artist a mini-grant to develop their site-specific sculptures. In the weeks leading up to the exhibition opening the artist’s concepts will be revealed on this site. Questions? Contact Rebecca Ansert, Curator, Green Public Art at rebecca@greenpublicart.com.

Wallen.Ruth Wallen.Ruth

CONCEPT: Dew Harvesters. San Diego receives less than ten inches of rain a year, with almost no precipitation falling between May and October, but yet many native plants stay green throughout the summer.  This project provides sculptures to harvest dew and/or fog, demonstrating the way that local plants survive during the summer months.  Dew harvesting was practiced in antiquity and is again being explored as populations grow, climates change, and water becomes increasingly scarce. Actual dew harvesters would generally be much larger than the proposed sculptures.  While these sculptures are functional, harvesting a small amount of potable water that could be used to water a garden, they are also meant to raise awareness about the local ecology and the need to regard water as a precious resource.

ABOUT: Ruth Wallen is a multi-media artist whose work is dedicated to encouraging dialogue about ecological and social issues. She has created outdoor interactive “nature walks” at Carmel Mountain, the San Bernardino Children’s Forest and Tijuana River Estuary, and has participated in group exhibitions at the Long Beach Museum of Art and the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, Colorado. She is a founding member of the multiethnic/national collaborative artist group Las Comadres.  Her work is included in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Light Work, New York. and the Atheneum San Diego. She has published critical essays in journals including LEONARDO, Exposure, High Performance, The Communication Review, and Women’s Studies, as well as two anthologies, With Other Eyes: Race, Gender, and Visual Culture and Blaze: Discourse on Art, Women and Feminism.  She is core faculty in the interdisciplinary arts MFA program at Goddard College, a lecturer at the University of California, San Diego and was a Fulbright lecturer at the Autonomous University of Baja California, Tijuana.  She received her BA from Swarthmore College and her MFA from the University of California, San Diego.

Rebecca Ansert, founder of Green Public Art, is an art consultant who specializes in artist solicitation, artist selection, and public art project management for both private and public agencies. She is a graduate of the master’s degree program in Public Art Studies at the University of Southern California and has a unique interest in how art can demonstrate green processes or utilize green design theories and techniques in LEED certified buildings.

Green Public Art is a Los Angeles-based consultancy that was founded in 2009 in an effort to advance the conversation of public art’s role in green building. The consultancy specializes in public art project development and management, artist solicitation and selection, creative community involvement and knowledge of LEED building requirements. Green Public Art also works with emerging and mid-career studio artists to demystify the public art process. The consultancy acts as a resource for artists to receive one-on-one consultation before, during, and after applying for a public art project.

Go to Green Public Art

eco-art course

The 1st International Eco-Artists’ Residency

Call for artists

We are happy to announce the opening of the first international artist residency which specializes in ecological art, in the world.

The Photography & Eco-art Centre, includes a charming and relaxing artist residency which allows the artist to create, explore or fill batteries, in a homely environment.

To apply for the residency please send us information about you and your artistic achievements:

  1. Full name, country, state, address, phones and e mails, website.
  2. Short CV, including a list of solo exhibitions, locations and issues addressed. Short list of group exhibitions.
  3. Abstract of at least two of your main projects ( short description, not more than 300 words each)
  4. Five-ten Photos of your artwork ( JPG, 70DPI), preferred those which are related
  5. to environmental issues and captions/descriptions in a net quality.

Please indicate, what would you like to do while you are here according to priority?

  • Receive eco-art workshops, and/ or an environmental photography workshop, and/or ceramic workshop, or work in a welding and wood studio* ( *only for experienced artists)?
  • Register for the Eco-art course
  • Walks and hikes, create new artwork  ( please describe )
  • Make your research for a new artwork based on the ecosystem near the residency?
  • Volunteer in studio office, in the garden?
  • Make contacts with local artists, ecologists?  Receive environmental consultant for a new artwork?
  • Studying at the eco-art studio, archive and professional library
  • Other?

Please indicate preferred dates and desired length for residency ( minimum a week-two monthes)

Costs: The artist is encouraged to apply for a grant in his/her own country/university/ community. A letter of invitation can be sent to selected artists. Please send request for costs of stay.

The Eco-art Residency is making a huge effort to find grants for needed guests, and is looking for funding.

To support the residency please call- 972-2-9912101

or write to eco.art.center@gmail.com

via eco-art course.

Featured Artist: Dianna Cohen

as published in the Fall 2009 issue of the CSPA Quarterly

Los Angeles-based multi-media visual artist, painter and curator Dianna Cohen is best known for her two-dimensional and three-dimensional works using recycled plastic bags – sewn together – ranging from small hanging pieces to room-sized installations. 

Cohen’s work has been applied to surfboards in the acclaimed group show FLOW – fine lines on water, which she also curated. In 2007, Cohen expanded into making wearable art pieces using recycled materials, including stage outfits for alt-rock duo The Ditty Bops and a “green carpet” dress for actress Rachelle Carson. Her “conscious couture” and art were featured on Ed Begley’s environmentally themed HGTV series Living With Ed and on the CBS EcoZone Project with Daisy Fuentes. 

Other projects include:  The Curse, a book of stories at: www.thecurse.com and Citizenlove, new 2008 textiles based on her plastic work and viewable at: www.citizenlove.com

Solo shows include post, Art Affairs gallery in Amsterdam, the Sutton Gallery in Melbourne, and Frank Pictures in Santa Monica, CA. She has shown in group exhibitions at Affirmation Arts in NYC, the Riverside Art Museum in Riverside, the Bronx Museum in NYC and the Tampa Museum of Art in Florida.

In 2008, she had work in the exhibition Just How Does A Patriot Act at The OCCCA in Orange County and at SPARC in Venice, CA and in the exhibition Recreate in Santa Monica.

In 2009, Cohen had solo exhibitions at Elizabeth Budia Gallery, Barcelona, and Art From Scrap in Santa Barbara. In 2010, her work will be exhibited in BCN: Nights Gallery in Barcelona, Spain.

www.plasticpollutioncoalition.org

www.diannacohen.com