Category: Environmental Art
The Foragers: A World of Enchantment and Intimacy
January 25, 2016By Catalina Lassen, Environmental Art & PR Intern
The Schuylkill Center is proud to present Melissa Maddonni Haims and Josh Haims’ latest venture, The Foragers, a whimsical exhibition featuring photographs and delicate yarn sculptures of regional fungal life. In my time helping prepare and install this exhibition, what has stood out to me the most has been the enchantment and intimacy of the world the Haims’ create. As I step into the gallery now, the show completely set and ready to go, I sense myself stepping into the deep of the forest. Quiet, but flourishing, The Foragers takes the viewer…
Hackensack Dreaming: Big & Small
December 8, 2015By Christina Catanese, Director of Environmental Art
Nancy Cohen’s Hackensack Dreaming has transformed our gallery space into an immersive experience evoking the complex wetlands of the Hackensack River. One of my favorite parts of this installation is how it is big and small at the same time. I feel enveloped in the space, and at the same time there are seemingly infinite details to discover the longer I look – in a similar way to being in nature itself.
There are upwards of 120 individual pieces in Cohen’s installation, all handmade glass and paper. I asked a few staff and…
Environmental Art at Nature Preschool
November 20, 2015By Rebecca Dhondt, Sassafras Lead Teacher
When people think of a preschool experience, art almost always comes to mind. Children need art, not only for the development of their creativity, but as a support for growing cognitive, social, and motor abilities.
All high quality preschool programs incorporate art daily. Walking into a typical classroom, parents will see evidence of painting, gluing and sculpture. Hopefully there will be a well-developed art center with various supplies that are easily accessible to the children. Also, completed works of art will be clearly labeled and prominently displayed around the room and in the halls.…
Dear 2040: Diane Burko on art, the earth, and 2040
November 11, 2015By Diane Burko
TIME CAPSULE FOR 2040
What our global environment in general and Philadelphia in particular will look like all depends on how and IF the public heeds the dire warnings about Climate Change all around us now in 2015. Today’s global temperature data keep 2015 as hottest year to date. When surface temperatures are combined with ocean heat content, scientists chart warming continuing at a rapid rate. On Tuesday, March 24, the temperature in Antarctica rose to 63.5°F - a record for the polar continent. More glaciers than ever are retreating throughout the world. Storms and droughts are…
Time + Art: A sculpture Changes with the Forest
November 5, 2015By Christina Catanese, Director of Environmental Art, and Anna Lehr Mueser, Public Relations Manager
Since it was installed in April 2015, Jake Beckman's installation Future Non-object #1 has been changing with the forest around it. Created through the LandLab environmental art residency program, the sculpture was designed to address a local ecological problem. In this case, a lack of woodland fungi. The installation, involving over 1,000 small pieces of wood inoculated with fungi, will slowly decompose into the forest, providing habitat for the fungi.
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By the way, Jake Beckman's going to be…
It’s not about the bees, it’s about the we
August 11, 2015By Marguerita Hagan 2014 – 2015 LandLab Resident Artist, for the Native Pollinator Garden Residency with Maggie Mills and Ben Mills
[caption id="attachment_266605" align="aligncenter" width="235"] Bee foraging Purple Hyssop: Native Pollinator Garden[/caption]
“In the village, a sage should go about like a bee, which, not harming flower, color scent, flies off with the nectar.” – Anonymous, Dhammapada
[caption id="attachment_266606" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Native Pollinator Garden: blue mistflower zinc etched plate by Maggie Mills, handcrafted chemical-free Douglas fir post by Ben Mills & pit fired ceramic bees by Marguerita Hagan & the community[/caption]
One year has circled around completing our complex LandLab…
#StormSnakes – The Experiment Continues
July 30, 2015By Leslie Birch, 2014-2015 LandLab Resident Artist
My LandLab project started with the idea of examining water quality and morphed into understanding and mitigating stormwater run-off, the primary water quality concern facing the Schuylkill Center’s streams. It's been interesting to see the changes along the way, much like a meandering stream. There's been discovery in understanding how storms are affecting the land at the Center, brainstorming around ideas to deter the run-off, and definitely a period of inventing. Last we left off, I had been in discussion with Steve at Stroud Water Research Center about the sensors for my stream monitor.…
Natural Dyeing: from plant to fabric
June 30, 2015By Guest Contributors Elissa Meyers and Mira Adornetto
After pulling out green cotton fabric from a naturally fermenting indigo vat, our workshop group watches excitedly as the green transitions into a dark indigo blue. This incredible process, which occurs as the indigo dye oxidizes has been used for thousands of years in numerous places and cultures. Throughout human history, color has been applied to fibers on every continent, starting as far back as 2,600 BCE. Plants, shellfish, and insects: wildflowers, trees, mollusks and bugs, have been used to dye fibers.
Since the industrial revolution dyeing went from natural colorants like…
Interview with Deenah Loeb: Art in the Open
June 8, 2015By Christina Catanese, Director of Environmental Art
Editor’s note: Deenah Loeb is a Schuylkill Center trustee who also serves as the Executive Director of the City Parks Association and was on the founding creative team for Art in the Open, a citywide event in which artists create their work outdoors on the Schuylkill Banks for three days in May. This summer, nine artists from Art in the Open 2014 will present their work in the Schuylkill Center gallery and on the trails this summer in the show Open Spaces. Director of Environmental Art Christina Catanese recently sat down with Loeb…
Has it really been 15 years?
April 2, 2015By Mary Salvante
Editor’s note: 2015 marks the Schuylkill Center’s 50th anniversary along with the 15th anniversary of the art program. As part of our ongoing celebration of this milestone, we invited Mary Salvante, the founder of the art program, to write a reflection on the past 15 years.
Where does the time go? Seems like just recently I was visiting the Center for the first time. My first impression then was the notion that it would be a perfect location for an art program, and more specifically, an installation at the front entrance.
In 1999, the Schuylkill Center had…
