Category: LandLab
LandLab Dream Journal
October 3, 2019LandLab Dream Journal
Guest post by LandLab Artist Kate Farquhar
Editor’s Note: LandLab is the Schuylkill Center’s environmental art residency program. Kate Farquhar was named a resident artist in 2017 and recently wrapped up her project, titled Synestates. She installed a series of three sculptures on the Schuylkill Center’s trails - come visit us to see them. This blog post is Kate’s reflection on time at the Schuylkill Center and a peek into her creative process.
I'm currently wrapping up my LandLab residency at the Schuylkill Center: a chapter in my relationship to a place that I will…
Kate Farquhar’s Synestates: Art, Nature, and Humans
August 15, 2019by Communications Intern Charlotte Roach
As you wander the trails of the Schuylkill Center, you may notice some objects that look a little out-of-place. What are those chains doing hanging from those tree branches? What are those white geometric shapes on the surface of Wind Dance Pond? Those objects are art installations, part of our LandLab environmental art residency, created by resident artist Kate Farquhar. Kate is a Philadelphia-based environmental artist and landscape architect with a passion for green design. Her series is called Synestates, and its purpose it to explore how human-made building materials can interact with nature.
pvines,…
Reflecting on Remembering Water’s Way: Artist Guest post
January 10, 2019By Cassie Meador, Choreographer/Executive Artistic Director of Dance Exchange
Editor’s note: The LandLab resident artists of 2017-2018 (including this Dance Exchange project along with Kate Farquhar and Jan Mun) will be featured in a gallery exhibition at the Center for Emerging Visual Artists, opening with a reception on January 10, 2019. More information at: https://www.cfeva.org/events/cfeva-exhibitions/landlab2019
Over this past year, I have been working with the Schuylkill Center as part of their LandLab Residency program to address an environmental challenge through dancemaking and community participation.
On our first research walk at the center, I noticed several large bundles of sticks being…
Moving Field Guides: Learning through Dance at Naturepalooza
April 19, 2018“The Moving Field Guide relies on discovery and observation, which are important skills across all disciplines. It allows nearly all age groups to participate, it promotes critical thinking, it encourages participants to engage their environment, and allows for creative expression.” —Jessie L Scott III, Boston Urban Connections Coordinator, USDA Forest Service
Cassie Meador is thrilled to be returning to Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education as part of Naturepalooza, the Center’s Family Earth Day Celebration. As part the festivities, families will get outdoors to learn about local ecology and the ways in which water shapes our lives through a series…
LandLab: Introducing our artists in residence
October 12, 2017By Christina Catanese, Director of Environmental Art
Even though I haven’t myself had a first day of school for a few years, in the fall, I still get a back-to-school-esque twinge of anticipation. In this season, you can feel something new coming in the air - something to be learned, something to gear up for - and I find it to be the most exciting time of year. This year, one of the most exciting new things for the environmental art program is the beginning of the second offering of our LandLab residency at the Schuylkill Center.
LandLab is a…
Weaving Good and Bad
June 1, 2017By Liz Jelsomine, Environmental Art & PR Intern
When you think of weeds, you probably think of unwanted, unsightly plants invading and stealing vital nutrients from your lawn or garden. While this may be true for some species, further thought about weeds brings up interesting questions. What is it about a plant that categorizes it as being invasive, and could these pesky plants be of any benefit?
Artists Kaitlin Pomerantz and Zya S. Levy explored ideas such as this at the Schuylkill Center as part of their LandLab Residency, an environmental art residency program that integrates art, ecological restoration, and…
How to Be Like the Glaciers Melting
January 12, 2017Guest contributor Leslie Birch, 2014-2015 LandLab Resident Artist
A few years ago I sat at my computer reading the latest on the demise of the glaciers in the Arctic. I was angry with the polluting corporations, fed up with the greed of the oil industry, disgusted by people’s consumption, and alienated by a government ruled by lobbyists. I felt frozen, as if calamity had already happened; some days I was even bleak about the future. My home thermostat was set to 69, two of my computers were on, I was surrounded by electronic parts for a project and I was…
Art + Time at the Schuylkill Center: a 2017 wall calendar
October 13, 2016By Christina Catanese, Director of Environmental Art
One of the most important aspects of environmental art is leaving time for nature to respond to an art work. Change is a constant in the natural world, and when artists venture outside the controlled setting of the studio or gallery, art must be responsive to change, time, and seasons.
Indeed, many environmental art works are not complete until nature has had time to respond and artists have had time to understand and reconcile change in the work. Stacy Levy’s Rain Yard needs rain to fall for the collaboration with water to happen;…
Time + Art, Part 2: As an Anniversary Approaches
March 16, 2016By Catalina Lassen, Art + PR Intern
As spring bounds in again, another year has come and gone, and almost a year has passed since our LandLab artists in residence installed a variety of exciting environmentally minded artworks last April. This cycle of a year signifies not only an anniversary, but is also a reminder of the changes that have occurred during the time in-between. As far as the art of LandLab goes, the works have been activated by nature, shifting as the seasons do. Back in November we took a look at the progress of one of these installations,…
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…
