Firehouse Art Center Presents:

“Translated Landscapes”

OPENING JULY 12, 2024
RECEPTION JULY 13 at 12, 2024, Exhibition Reception- July 13, 2024 6pm-8pm MST

(Longmont, CO–June 27, 2024) The Firehouse presents Translated Landscapes, in which four artists redefine, reinterpret, and reconstruct the concept of humanity in relation to nature. Opening July 12, 2024, we explore the interplay between these ecosystems, patchworked together through different mediums and expressions. Tradition and modernity come together.
Featuring works by Chloe Wilwerding, Chuck Brenton, Kerry St. Laurent, and Adam Michael Kozak, these pieces not only fasten together ideas relating to the impermanence of life, but how the space in which we live that life has evolved. Each artist promotes an unexplored reality, tapping into the inherent structure and symbolism behind the environment that inspires them. Through diverse mediums, such as film, sound, embroidery and sculpture, these artists confront the unfortunate truth that nature is being isolated from the individual and tie tradition with modernity to examine how we approach our world.
Artist Talk: recorded July 28- https://youtu.be/iSEiVI9GXaU?si=vjoXggkobf3vpQTJ

Chloe Wilwerding (she/her) holds her MFA in Printmaking from Rhode Island School of Design (2019) and her BA in Political Science and Studio Art from Middlebury College (2015). She has been awarded residencies at Vermont Studio Center and Taleamor Park and scholarships from Ox-Bow School of Art and Artists’ Residency and Anderson Ranch Arts Center. She teaches for Rhode Island School of Design’s Continuing Education program and has worked as an adjunct faculty member for Montserrat College of Art. Recent exhibitions include A Way In at the Curfman Gallery at Colorado State University, Nature Lover at Southern Vermont Arts Center, and User Network at Lane Meyer Projects. Chloe lives in Steamboat Springs, Colorado.

“My work reflects my interest in big-picture, primordial questions about what it means to be human. Climate change and digital culture feature in my work as two challenges that require redefining what it means to be human and repositioning ourselves in relation to our changing environments. I make 2D, mixed-media works combining textiles, collage, photography, and painting. These brightly-colored pieces, frequently incorporating appropriated or found images, visually fragment our digital environments and the landscape. Through collecting and fragmentation, I hope to reassemble pieces from our information-overloaded, remix culture into a version of wholeness that helps us see and reimagine our place in a changing world.

The mixed-media textile pieces in this body of work explore the challenge of moving outside of a human perspective to truly know and love nature. Stock photos and printed found fabric present idealized versions of the landscape, removed from human impact. References to merit badges—created using machine embroidery—feature prominently as a human lens for viewing the environment and marking human “achievement” in relation to the environment. This body of work addresses the contrivance and simplification of human-created representations of nature and the performative nature of our nature-loving. Through anthropocentric representations of nature, I explore the ways we attempt to access nature and ultimately learn more about our limited human viewpoint in the process.”

 

Chuck Brenton is an Iowa-born artist who pursued studies in sculpture and environmental science. His work blends painting, sculpture, and wildlife observation. Brenton graduated from Colorado State University and has exhibited his work along Colorado’s Front Range, as well as in Crested Butte, Santa Fe, and Des Moines.

“My creative process is deeply immersed in the untamed wilderness of Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, drawing inspiration from the inherent structure of habitats and the intricate patterns found within them. Mountainous forms, vibrant colors, and data converge, revealing how I interpret and internalize these captivating environments.

Through fieldwork expeditions, I document wildlife species’ behavior using journaling, drawing, and photography. This personal observation is further translated into digital studies that are complemented by technological developments like GPS collar information and satellite imagery which inform areas of study and guide the creation of terrain forms. In my work, data becomes an indispensable medium.

The land-use data that captures the interplay between animals and the ecosystem, intersect with various elements of the landscape. Together, they are visually portrayed on the surface of the sculptures, where a juxtaposition of chaos and order unfolds. This process involves the application of a specialized polymer paint by hand, followed by a protective ceramic clear coating. The surface is then sanded and cured to achieve a smooth and glass-hard finish. The fusion of contemporary techniques with the elemental essence of bronze blends innovation and tradition.”

 

Kerry St. Laurent is a visual artist from Massachusetts who lingers in the spaces between realism and abstraction, chaos and meticulous detail. Life-curious and death-casual, her mixed-media work references nature, mapping, microbiology, architecture and memory, deconstructing the subjective lens and presenting impermanence as the grand unifier. Kerry received a BFA from the University of Massachusetts and MFA from the University of Hartford, and she is a faculty member at Western New England University.

 

Adam Michael Kozak is a musician and sound artist currently residing in Sunderland, MA. Kozak has worked within genres as disparate as lullabies, doom metal, and plunderphonic sound collage. Since 2018 he has released numerous albums under the moniker Burial Grid and his palette of choice includes synthesizers of all stripes, found sounds, low-quality acoustic instruments, and emphasizing imperfection through the use of dictaphones, old cell phones, and reel-to-reel tape machines.

Last Sequoia on Earth is an audiovisual exercise in “both can exist,” normalizing dichotomy and uncertainty. This work addresses and mourns the weighty reality of environmental collapse while simultaneously presenting a space for both creators and viewers to escape that same reality. Created via call and response between an audio and visual artist, this work embodies both isolation through individual process and connection through collaboration. The aleatoric quality of improvised electronic music interacts with footage of nature and ink manipulation. This immersive audiovisual work invites the viewer to physically step out of a familiar environment into one both sorrowful and soothing, connective and disruptive, heavy and buoyant.