An eye opening meeting last night at the Jewish Community Center. Facilitated by our Councilman, Doug Shields, Squirrel Hill area residents aired their grievances to Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority, Nine Mile Run Association, ALCOSAN, and City of Pittsburgh Public Works. The big picture is: due to the consistent rise in temperature, northeast cities have seen an upswing in dramatic rainwater events – for which our city’s infrastructure is ill-equipped. Residents testified to cleaning up human poop from combined sewage run-off in their yards and in their homes.
Artists’ Books on the Environment Closing Reception Join us on Tuesday, June 28 from 5-7 p.m. at Carnegie Mellon University, Arts Library and Special Collections, on the 4th floor of Hunt Library for a closing reception of the exhibition “Artists’ Books on the Environment.” This exhibition is currently being held in conjunction with “Too Shallow for Diving: the 21st Century is Treading Water” at the American Jewish Museum in Pittsburgh and includes books by artists in the AJM show. It features eighty works from miniature books to sculptural installations exploring every aspect of the human condition as influenced by our “natural” environment. Collectively the exhibition points to our ultimate remembering that human beings are inextricable forces within the ecological dynamic of our planet Earth and beyond.
The artists’ books exhibition continues through July 1. Works in the exhibition cases can be viewed anytime during library hours and in the Fine and Rare Book Room by appointment from Monday through Friday. For more information contact Mo Dawley, Art and Drama Librarian, 412-268-6625.
“Too Shallow for Diving: the 21st Century is Treading Water” with associated events continues at the Jewish Community Center through July 28 http://www.jccpgh.org/page/ajm
WATER’S WAYS: A Presentation & Discussion of Local Water Issues and Public Health
When: Monday, June 6, 7:00pm
Where: Jewish Community Center, 5748 Forbes Ave, Pittsburgh 15217 (Squirrel Hill near Murray Ave)
Contact: Ann Rosenthal, Dargan Street Studios, 412-688-0417, atrart
Web Site: http://www.jccpgh.org/page/ajmIn conjunction with the exhibition Too Shallow for Diving: the 21st Century is Treading Water, participating artists Ann Rosenthal and Steffi Domike have organized a discussion of local water issues and public health with environmental and academic leaders:
Dr. Patty DeMarco, Director of the Rachel Carson Institute, Chatham University will discuss water issues and choices for the 21st Century. Dr. Charles Christen, Director of Operations for the Center for Healthy Environments & Communities (CHEC) at University of Pittsburgh’s Graduate School of Public Health will address the public health implications of water and Marcellus Shale development. Dr. Christen worked closely with Dr. Conrad “Dan” Volz who recently resigned as Director of CHEC.
This event is free and open to the public. Those attending will have the opportunity to ask questions of the speakers and artists, and will be able to view the exhibition.
The exhibition Too Shallow for Diving: the 21st Century is Treading Water, guest curated by artist and educator Carolyn Speranza explores the environment, especially those issues surrounding water and its impact on our planet, human health and public welfare.
The dictionary tells us that a Requiem is a musical composition laying the souls of the dead to rest, presenting listeners with a remembrance of what has passed. Requiem for the Netmakers honors the loss of a way of life given by the sea – to generations of people working in the fishing industry globally – and in particular, the Gulf Coast of the United States. Requiem germinated with a news story on a family business where generations had earned their living through the art of net-making, and the business was decimated by the 2010 BP oil spill. “For the last remaining net maker in St. Bernard Parish, Erwin Menesses Jr., that’s meant a 95 percent drop in business,” read the story.
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Deciphering the art installation-
The installation encompasses two walls in the American Jewish Museum’s Robinson building galleries, intersecting at the doors to the Katz Performing Arts Center. The set-up has an element of ritual, in reflection of my time spent in pre-Katrina New Orleans. I had been entranced by the visual remembrances and homegrown artwork that people put up around grave sites, and hung in the chapel of St. Jude, asking the saint for assistance in the face of disease and loss of life. During the course of the exhibition the flowers will wilt and die and the ocean landscape, boat model and fishing lures may be enhanced with additional articles from the lives of fishermen, shrimpers and the net-makers. [Later in the exhibition I added both fishing nets and buoys to the piece]
The repetition of the horizontal line, in the shelves, arrangement of digital frames, electrical outlets and landscape video monitor are intentionally stratified, visually making present landscape in our art historical catalog, landscape in our ocean’s horizon lines and the landscape of our ever-growing digital networks. The use of wood, intended to harken back to a past life-style and to bring drift wood into the piece — transformed through Angelo Gatto’s contribution and his ease with using large, heavy materials.
In light of the years I spent looking at Anselm Kieffer landscapes and enjoying the gutsiness of Baselitz paintings, these elements make perfect sense for creating a framing foundation for the 2-walled piece – and in keeping an earth awareness in an artwork using a sizable amount of electronics.
The lower tier of digital frames are a family album of the fishing industry, mostly in the Gulf, going back into our history– even to a time when small children shelled shrimp before the implementation of child labor laws.
The upper tier of digital frames presents a series of color permutations on an ocean wave impregnated by oil from the BP spill– giving us an opportunity to be fascinated and disgusted-both by what human beings can do to the vast, beautiful and seemingly impenetrable ocean.
The pulse and heart of Requiem is the musical composition sculpted by Frank Ferraro in response to our back-and-forth conversations over what seemed like a short, intense period of time. we started with my question, “What does oil sludge sound like?” and in response to my queries, the initial dark ambient music was re-written as a 7 minute Requiem with the larger-than-life roles of the Global Corporate Gangsters, the Big Ocean, the fisher people, ghosts of oil drillers, a mermaid chorus and oil covered animals.
In re-viewing the edited video just now, I can hear the overall sadness, the plaintive piano and see the inevitable future we are headed in – unless we alter the course of human behavior on our planet.
May 14th at 7:00pm Too Shallow for Diving: the 21st Century is Treading Water opens to the public at the American Jewish Museum at the Jewish Community Center in Squirrel Hill. I will be speaking at 7:30 to introduce the project and to talk with you about creating new communities; the role of the artist; and issues on water and the environment. Please join me for an evening of engagement and celebration until 9:00 pm.
Throughout the course of the exhibition, environmental organizations will host citizen action workshops at the JCC, including Clean Water Action, Penn Environment and Penn Future. Green Drinks, a networking event for people working to make Pittsburgh greener in the areas of business, policy, new technologies and activism will be hosted by the AJM. Former professor Conrad “Dan” Volz, Jr., who recently resigned from his position at the University of Pittsburgh this April over his public health advocacy on water and natural gas drilling will give a presentation. Too Shallow for Diving artists will host workshops throughout the course of the exhibition which concludes July 28. All events are free and open to the public.
Too Shallow for Diving: the 21st Century is Treading Water has received funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Jewish Healthcare Foundation, The Buhl Foundation and The Sprout Fund. All of the exhibition’s artists have received honorariums to support the creation of new and provocative work.
TOO SHALLOW FOR DIVING: THE 21ST CENTURY IS TREADING WATER
AMERICAN JEWISH MUSEUM OF THE JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTER OF GREATER PITTSBURGH MAY 16 – JULY 28, 2011
OPENING SATURDAY, MAY 14TH, 7 – 9 P.M.
CURATOR’S TALK: CAROLYN SPERANZA at 7:30 P.M.
PERFORMANCE: VANESSA GERMAN at 8:00 P.M.
THE ARTISTS:
Tim Collins and Reiko Goto
Jim Denney
Vanessa German
Prudence Gill
Jamie Gruzska
Richard Harned
Roger Laib
Lisa Link
Maritza Mosquera
Wendy Osher
Ann T. Rosenthal and Steffi Domike
Carolyn Speranza and Frank Ferraro
David Stairs
Carolyn P. Speranza 