The Nature of Our Disposition is an art exhibition presented in the Foster Gallery at the University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire from October 16 to November 11. The show featured the work of regional, national, and international artists who's themes are centered around sustainability and issues relating to the current global climate crisis.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Foster Gallery is closed to those who are not students, faculty, or staff of UWEC. This virtual rendition of the exhibition allows community members and visitors to view the show safely from home.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Foster Gallery is closed to those who are not students, faculty, or staff of UWEC. This virtual rendition of the exhibition allows community members and visitors to view the show safely from home.
In the show:
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"My studio practice is an ongoing study on how the recordings and observations of art and science translate the places I inhabit and the way I navigate my time in them. Considering humanity's global impact on the environment I am interested in how art might stand as a memorial for a time passed or as an archive documenting a place that may no longer exist.
"Working alongside professor emeritus Robert Guza of The University of San Diego California Scripps School of Oceanography, I use qualitative data along with direct experience to record my careful observations. This is then translated using the methods of printmaking, papermaking, video, and photography as a way to capture a physical memory of the changing coastline. "This collection of art work in The Nature of Our Disposition exhibit stands as witness to human activity, loss, and beauty of the California coastline. Cities rush to find temporary alternatives to keep their sandy beaches alive but, in the end, the ocean is in control. Homes, businesses, and public infrastructure must deal with the impacts of an altered landscape. Erosion is accelerating, and the ocean sea level is rising. The coast is transforming it moves with the water, the earth, and the people that pass through it." |
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"Since 2009 I have been photographically documenting plastic objects on my local UK coast, and have amassed an archive of 3000+ images of individual items in situ on the beach.
"'An Undesirable Archive' sets out to reflect societies' over consumption, our desire for novelty in the plastic age and our relationship to the marine environment. For me they also present a paradoxical dilemma, between a wish to find these treasures through the enjoyable process of beach combing, and a desire that the environment was free from them. "The cause of their arrival are many; some are sea born and float from further shores and rivers, some arrive from the shipping lanes that skirt our coasts, most are from the holiday makers and visitors to our coastal towns and villages. "While there is no escaping the obvious, and important ecological subject matter the work presents, each object also raises questions regarding its own history, the reasons for its location on the beach, and the unknowable story of previous owners. "Formatted as a grid system wall installation, a4 prints highlight the individual amongst the many, and are curated and positioned purely by gallery staff." |
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"This Empty World addresses the escalating destruction of the natural world at the hands of humankind, showing a world where, overwhelmed by runaway development, there is no longer space for animals to survive. The people in the photos are also often helplessly swept along by the relentless tide of 'progress'.
"Each image is a combination of two moments in time, captured weeks apart, almost all from the exact same locked-off camera position: "Initially, a partial set is built and lit. Sometimes, such as with a dead forest, it is actually the complete set. Weeks, even months follow, whilst the animals that inhabit the region become comfortable enough to enter the frame. Once the animals are captured on camera, the full sets - bridge and highway construction sites, a petrol station, a bus station and more - are built by the art department team. In all but a few of the photos, the camera remains fixed in place throughout." |
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"The depiction of land has often been used as a means of celebrating or critiquing culture. The use of pastoral views, banal architecture and everyday trash problematize the traditional definitions of a natural landscape. Through the process of transforming and miniaturizing materials found in the land, objects, in their new context are no longer discernible as natural or man-made. The juxtaposition of representational modes and materials create a hybrid space where the romanticized and actual intermingle. Contrasts between the flat, painted vistas and artifacts from the land expose the illusion of representation and subsequently confuse the pictorial space, calling into question the authenticity of the objects. The forms fracture the pictorial space, at times, inhabiting the frames, robbing them of their ability to define a single view and inviting a phenomenological exploration by the viewer."
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"The skin is an organ that separates us from the rest of the world, but if you look closer, you actually realize that it’s very permeable, and a lot of things can really flow through – like small molecules, water, even viruses and some microbes. And it creates more like this quasi- or blurry boundary between what we consider us humans and the rest of nature outside of our body."
Peter Krsko listens to nature and creates objects and experiences to share his observations. His approach combines science and art; participatory, interactive and community arts; and play with hands-on education. |
In the media:
‘The Nature of Our Disposition’: Student-Curated Exhibition Explores Climate Change by Rebecca Mennecke, VolumeOne
Blugold senior is first-known student to curate outside exhibition at Foster Gallery by Gary Johnson, UWEC IMC
The Nature of Our Disposition by Amanda Bulger, UWEC Art & Design
Blugold senior is first-known student to curate outside exhibition at Foster Gallery by Gary Johnson, UWEC IMC
The Nature of Our Disposition by Amanda Bulger, UWEC Art & Design