Collocation at Pritchard Park

KUOW series on public art

2005-12-15T09:46:00.000-08:00

This week, KUOW has been featuring a series on public art. Today, there was a phone call to the moderator that mentioned Collocation. For an archived audio version of the Thursday, December 15 Weekday show, go to www.kuow.org.

Comments from the Guest Book

2005-12-15T09:43:00.000-08:00

The following is the collection of entries from the Collocation/ArtSite2005 Guest Book

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Bainbridge Island Public Art Committee
Administered by
Bainbridge Island Arts & Humanities Council

3 August
Mileth Klein
Scarlet Klein
Brad Klein
Nita Klein

7 August
Dennis Brandt
Sandy DiLena, Toronto, Ontario
Kathleen McCabe, Toronto, Canada
Wayne & Rebecca Madison
Steve, Charlotte Humphry
Dennis Coffey
Ruth Courtland,
LA, CA

Jim Holden, Suquamish, WA
WOW – TOO KOOL

M.L. Ott & G.S. Howarth, Bainbridge Island
Sandy Neale
Shiers & guests
Susan Jackson & Sister
P.C. Harper
Absolutely Terrific! Thanks.

9 August
James James Patterson Patterson
Viki Walaskay
Forrest & Clayton Gurowitz
Gray Yockman
Hawk

11 August
Elizabeth Blake
Thank you.
Dan & Sonya Carvin
Peace to all
Christ Davenport
Ken Ragsdale
Ruth
Maia
Esther Parvin
John Young
Adam Rabinowitz

13 August
Shinto Imai – Bainbridge-Seattle
Great site, great curiosity & some very good work to transform & make aware
S. Main, Connecticut
My compliments to the blackberry artist. Where can I get more of her work?
Denise Johnson, Post Falls, ID
Fun, great for exploring
John & Sue Anderson, Bainbridge Island, WA

14 August
Dave & Gail Christensen, Bainbridge
Mary Ann & Don Christensen, Ketchikan
Joan Hutchinson & Curtis Hughes, Bainbridge Island
Lee E. Fickle, Bainbridge Island
Sandra Ramsden, Brisbane, Australia
A different experience
Jack & Nan Fleming, Poulsbo, WA
Fun
Marianne Hanson, Seattle
Brenda Hughes, Seattle
Linda Younker with Sally Robison, Bainbridge Island

21 August
Keiko Shimada, Japan
Michael Sharp & Diane Francis, Bainbridge Island
Pam & Jack Johnson, Bainbridge Island
Adele Berg-Layton, Bainbridge Island
K. MacDonald, San Francisco, CA
Jeanne, Harry & Miles Thomas, Seattle, WA
Karen Cornell, Bainbridge Island
Lanara Stone, Bainbridge Island
Steve & Marilyn Gray, Beaverton, OR

Garbage – who are you kidding?

What a bunch of crap – is there anything you won’t classify as “art”? But to be fair, it’s great for a laugh…

Val Torrens & Dave Russo, Poulsbo, WA
Everyone’s a critic – too bad. Good idea and great way to spend some time. Thanks!
28 August
Martha Bien, Bainbridge Island

John Robbins, Naperville, IL
#3 Best City, Voted by Money Magazine!
Oh, the effort everyone “put in” to make this trail interesting – and a learning experience too. Saw my first English laurel and loved the “lid display”. Thank you! A wonderful kind of art… that tempts, teases, and makes one think and ask questions. Thank everyone who played a part. JR

Thank you.
Richard Thurston
Daniela Siegenthaler

29 August
Karen A. Wilken, Bainbridge Island & Fairbanks, AK

O’Reilly Fam, Highland Drive, Missoula, MT

4 Teachers from T.T. Minor School in Seattle on retreat @ Idlewood

30 August
Kathryn & Laughanne MacDonald
Thanks!

#7 Wow! Swept us away…Timmie

1 September
Liked the foundation and view point – Rick
Loved the art AND the blackberries. We don’t have those in Arizona. Mimi, Yuma, AZ

3 September
Joyce Rudolph
Laurie Anting
Micki Kent
Willa Foster

Thank you! Priscilla & Helene

4 September
Reynolds Family – Cool Stuff

Nigel, London – I felt like I was at a famous museum.

Colleen Ziakin – Thanks!

Found new inspiration! Marty & Jill Stone

5 September
Thanks for doing this. Good luck converting this to a park. Dan Kaylor, Seattle, WA
The Strathdee Family, Bainbridge Island – Great Display!

Margot Jacobs, Bainbridge Island
Interesting stuff! Somewhat challenging for old people! Couldn’t find 8-9-10-11. Followed a trail after 6, no flags, so decided wrong way. Did go under a beautiful tunnel of trees but came to a small gully which I decided not to leap across. Yes, I had the map. I will go see 10 & 11.

John Materner, Bainbridge Island
Interesting interpretation of the site past, present & future.

9 September
Glad to get to Bainbridge while this art is still up – we’ve heard about all the work that has gone into the effort from Jenny Tolefson and wanted to check out Kristin’ work – my fooks who now live here walked the whole site and enjoyed feeling how the different artists expressed themselves in this special place. Kristin – I wanted to crawl into your art! What a great space you created – I was a fort building child! Thanks! Sonja, Svend, Edie Hartmann & Steve Prather

Thanks again! Always happy to see and support the Arts! Kay & Charlie Watkins, Bainbridge Island

10 September
Thank you! Kim Sather
Great Park! Steve Seifried, age 10

13 September
What a birthday present to myself by visiting Collocation! Thank you! Bruce Wallace, Winslow
Theresa Connolly, Seattle
Make this permanent! Phyllis Cairns, Bainbridge Island
Will & Chappe Langemack, Bainbridge Island
Allegra Archer
It was very fun and cool.

21 September
What a nice way to spend an hour on the last day of summer – first day of fall. The view of Seattle from the platform was stunning!!! It seems obvious to me who girdled those beautiful trees. Sondra Kay, Bainbridge – Clean up this site!!!

Perri Lynch's FloatingDatum:FixedGrid

2005-11-02T12:42:00.000-08:00

The beach plateau forms an arc to the west of the EPA site, a gravelly open space between trees and sea. The vortex sits farthest back from the beach and catches the wind when it blows to the West from the mouth of Eagle Harbor. Birds also nest in the gravel, and I have found a bare egg resting in a tuft of grass here.

Perri Lynch gravitated toward this site immediately, and her proposal for work reflected this connection. A grid of poles would be installed between land and water, fitted with wind indicators at the tops. As she envisioned it, "The wind indicators will pattern the directional flow and velocity of air currents. In very high winds, the piece will emit a low humming sound. The grid structure references the human compulsion to map and monitor while the sensors remind us to look and feel. This installation will create an interstitial relationship between the natural rhythms of Pritchard Park and mankind’s systematic tendencies towards land use. As a reclaimed Superfund area, I can’t imagine a more poignant place for this work."

This piece was unique to the site in its scale, its complexity of installation, and the life it took on in the larger context of the site. It was visible from a distance across the water from the ferry, from many angles of pedestrian approach, and was a piece to maneuver around and through. One of my favorite views was from the adjacent beach. From this slightly lower angle, you saw the poles rise out of the haze of blackberries and brush, capped with the flowing field of flags.

FloatingDatum:FixedGrid plays out the tension of the place on multiple levels, that theme that I found sustained throughout the vast variety of work in this show. We see deliberate human handiwork interface with the will of the wind, the imposition of industrial materials and processes on a fragile and resilient site, the calm poetry of the poles and flags as the work pins down its corner of earth. This work generates commentary and silence.

Perri's own words about her piece: "My work investigates the relationship between human perception and sense of place. Navigation, intuition, and physical proximity are key components of these investigations. I am drawn to landmarks such as billboards, survey stations, and cairns that influence our sense of direction and lead us onward. Sense of place does not exist outside of ourselves. It shifts relative to our bodies, our memories, and what we choose to pay attention to. I hope to draw attention to details in our surroundings that are often overlooked or unheard. With more sensitivity towards our environments, we all may derive a deeper sense of place.

FloatingDatum:FixedGrid examines ways in which our Cartesian sensibilities superimpose order on the world and nature’s assertion in response. The grid references mankind’s compulsion to map and monitor. Wind sensors remind us to look and feel. A regimented, axial construct is staged in forced harmony with the natural rhythms of Pritchard Park."

Amanda Sturgeon's Rock Wall

2005-11-02T12:38:00.000-08:00

The Pritchard Park site has many physical attributes that make it a phenomenal and unique place on Bainbridge Island. The hillside woven with trails and foliage wraps the upper edge of a stretch of beachy waterfront rarely found in the Puget Sound. Interestingly, the terrain is partially imported, a result of the capping of the former creosote facility. And at the present, both coexist in a primary way: the sandy shoreline is flanked by a chain link fence wound with razor wire to enclose the EPA monitoring site.

It is this edge and demarcation that Amanda Sturgeon explores with her artwork. That she is an architect passionate about sustainability and living lightly on the earth is pertinent here: her rock wall comes out of and returns to the earth. We see emergence and disappearance, light and shadow, retention and fluidity. The rocks in the piece were gathered from the surrounding site and captured within a wireframe cage, situated parallel to the chain link fence. Two walls, two forms.

Hers is a quiet piece on the first reading: a sinuous gesture of an earthworked line. But there is also subtext: the gradated color of the rock wall from the dark base to the light top suggest earth's strata on one hand, and the process of interring the creosote pollution that has laid beneath this site on another. And the question of the wall's strength provokes as well, for it is clearly an inviting human-scale piece for sitting, but over time the wall sagged and morphed under its own weight.

Amanda writes: "I have created a natural stone wall adjacent to the chain link fence of the EPA site to juxtapose against the man-made steel wall that contains the creosote pollution. Formed within a chicken wire framework, the wall is undulating and contained at the same time.

The wall will symbolize the future of the park, curving, undulating and embracing as it emerges from the now clean ground. The wall expresses the natural beauty of the site and invites interaction by providing a suggestion of protection and shelter. It’s presence alongside the steel wall and barbed wire fence will offer contemplation of the site’s polluted history."

Polly Purvis' Ruins & Light

2005-11-01T12:12:00.000-08:00

When I first saw Polly's work, I was struck by the fluidity with which she moves between media. She works primarily in photography and sculptural metalwork, bridging both with compelling imagery of figures and gestures.

At the point when she chose the derelict shed site for her installation, I saw how this interest in portraying human evidence dovetailed with her affinity for the aesthetic of archaeology. The work takes place at a portion of the park at which people worked and lived. A metal clad shed has collapsed in upon itself and creates a shallow basin flanked by wooden structures that suggest a clothesline could have stood to one side. Walking the trail a bit further, the other side of the clothesline stands above a neat pile of composite roofing shingle scraps.

With Polly's installation, the outlines of the space and its contours are revealed through careful cleaning and deliberate mark-making. The bones of the building surface with her removal of composted leaves and trash. Neon green, yellow and pink colored translucent plexiglas rods sprout from the ruined shed, drawing in the ambient light and luring our viewing eye along the walk toward the roofing shingles. Portions of the siding have been reconfigured into a graceful female form at one corner of the site. Pink plexiglas sheet and rod accent existing architectural details: a series of rungs, the triangular span of the clothesline support. And in the pile of roofing material we are given a glimpse into the possibility of the former inhabitants: photographs of dancing ghosts are tucked shyly into the mound. Shadows of human interaction with place abound in this work.

Polly's statement reads: "My sculptural constructions are inspired by human metaphor and my ongoing engagement with shadow and light. Themes of culture and history, ecology and memory are present in my work, as is a strong connection to landscape and the human figure.

Combining fabricated and natural materials with my photographs is at the core of my constructions. The transformation resulting from this interplay of silver emulsion and chemistry of photography, with metal and translucent materials is magical alchemy. My goal is to convey the spirit and essence of my subjects. They become after all, a celebration of the creative act.

Two sculptures rise out of the worker cottage ruins on the Park’s upper trail; both works incorporate artifacts found at the site with contemporary, ‘manufactured’ materials, drawing attention to the contrast of natural and fabricated, past and present."

Kristin Tollefson's Bliss

2005-10-31T15:43:00.000-08:00

Emerging from the laurel grove, one finds oneself in a grove of another sort. Bamboo sprouts crowd up the hill in a thicket of strong stalks. Along the edge of the trail to the right is a natural quince bower, created by two lichen-encrusted specimens that have grown together in a knot of branches. Past the bower is a natural room skirted on the back and sides by the aforementioned bamboo, and carpeted by ivy.

I was drawn to this space very early on in the process of looking at the site, and for many reasons considered it to be too precious, or entirely complete without my interference. And all the same, I kept returning and questioning my draw to the place. In the end, I realize I wanted to make the vastness of the site smaller and more intimate, that I wanted to reference my personal relationship with the place which includes making a special hideaway for my kids, and to call into mind the historical fact that there was a valid domestic aspect to what is now seen primarily as a derelict industrial zone.

The chair frames were salvaged from under the laurel grove next door, and woven with raw steel wire. Black wooden beads punctuate the back rest and mimic the blackened quince that I discovered beneath the ivy and propped in the bower.

"My work derives its form from the organic and constructed worlds of botany and personal adornment. Utilizing traditional fiber techniques of stitching and weaving, I build my work out of metal wire and surplus, cast-off or industrial materials; I relish the tension inherent in creating beautiful, precious objects out of ordinary components. Inspiration for my forms is drawn from sources as wide-ranging as botanical illustration, folk art, fractals, and food preservation. Simultaneously scientific and poetic, these sculptures often assemble multiple simple elements into complex wholes, addressing themes of generative and transformative processes, the value of production and attention to detail, and the dialogue between interior and exterior space.

Bliss is a space that engages the domestic and the dream. It is a place into which we retreat. It is of this earth, but not of this world."

Ruth Marie Tomlinson's Beauty & Desire

2005-10-31T13:32:00.000-08:00

After the sharp turn up toward the woods from the edge of the ravine, the end of an old homesite becomes evident: bottles, the inside drum of a washer, and a homemade concrete threshold printed with hands of varying sizes were left here. Plants also indicate previous domestic life, and the 20 foot hight sprawling laurel marks the entry to Ruth Marie Tomlinson's piece.

Under the shady green canopy are books and specimen envelopes that chronicle several of the non-native plant species introduced to this site, including holly, butterfly bush, laurel and bamboo. The books hold anecdotal and scientific information about the plants, while the specimen envelopes hold a sample leaf backed by paper with the word "desire" or "beauty" in delicate script.

About her work in general Ruth Marie writes, "I have come to view nature as environment, including all the spaces and systems I inhabit and because I am part of these systems, I too, am nature. It has been a gentle but powerful shift from reverence for what is outside and separate, to an acknowledgement of my role within the system. I no longer look at nature as exotic; rather I see it as everyday. It is the grass pushing through my sidewalk and it is the sidewalk and it is the person who put the sidewalk there. It is the goods I buy, the politics I set into motion, as well as the sun raising over the Cascades and setting in the Olympics. This changing view of nature has inspired my interest in a marriage of industrial or man-made materials with forms derived from plants, animals, geology and the elements. It has also driven my interest in making art that creates environment and places the viewer as subject in that work, establishing an environment that revels in ambiguities and complexities of meaning / experience."

Regarding installation of UnderStory, she wrote the following: "Beneath this overgrown laurel hedge, remnant of someone’s careful yard, hangs a collection of preserved plant specimens, all gathered from plants imposed at Pritchard Park. These specimens tell a story of desire and conquest. Hanging books hold field notes documenting the current state of five imposed plant species. Each is a beautifully domestic plant, the desire of a family home, but potentially ruinous to the native environment. The books themselves await ruin, exposed to the elements. This work explores a blurred line between nature and culture. Pritchard Park is full of this ambiguity, the landscape rich with evidence of how much we are part of nature and yet deny our role within a symbiotic system."

Michelle Arab's Epiphyte

2005-10-31T13:14:00.000-08:00

As you continue on the path, you pass a stretch of uninhabited space where no artists chose to place work. It skirts along the top of the ridge that drops steeply on one side toward the water, and heads gently up through heavy brush on the other side. Michelle had spoken to me about being drawn into the site because of its contours: she gravitated toward the ravine, down to the low spots that were nested at the crook of the cliff that abutted the beach.

Her piece at the big leaf maple creates its own kind of hollow in spite of its location at the crest of the steep hill, and because of her choice of material and treatment. The cluster of trunks has been wrapped in twine, methodically and in a linear pattern. The upright of the trees creates ribs for an oversized basket, of which the twine forms the weft. One space between two trunks has been left open, and viewers could enter the piece.

I was struck by the play of light on this piece -- how sun penetrated or reflected off the surface of the sometimes taut, then slackening line.

Michelle's own words: "My work investigates the relationship between art, landscape and architecture by creating conceptually driven, site specific pieces that reveal latent histories and stories.

Epiphyte
Supported by Big Leaf Maple trunks, the wrapping cotton twine will transform over the course of the three-month exhibit as the twine absorbs moisture. The changes in the environment will cause the initially taut lines to relax and break down the twine screen."

Dan Linz' Monolith

2005-10-27T20:18:00.000-07:00

Continuing on the trail through the eastern portion of Pritchard Park, you cross between the posts of an old barbed wire fence pinned to the edge of the bluff overlooking the EPA site. Just past the jog in the path, Dan Linz' piece is tucked on this crest, its imposing weight suspended improbably from a tree. It is a huge and dominating piece, and it is easily subsumed into its surroundings. If you aren't looking, you will miss it.

Dan's work embodies the buzz of contradictions within this place that I wanted to unveil through this show. His piece could hang anywhere, and yet it is quintessentially about and from this site. It is framed in a rectangular box, and because of that it is incongruous here, in this mass of undergrowth. But it is seamless as well: the box repeats the straight lines of the fenceposts and creosoted poles that dot the landscape, and the box form holds a collection of specimens from the site. Wound on the left side is a length of barbed wire cut from the adjacent fence, tacked to the base is corrugated iron roofing from a fallen shed, and collected across the face are other artifacts: a deer skull, gravel shiny black with the reference to creosote, an abandoned gasoline can and an old toy loader are some.

His gift is distilling the sense of discovery one encounters in this environment at the site. Darkness and beauty and mystery and sickness and hope intermingle here. He collects and displays with interest and lack of judgment, he witnesses and speaks through his work.

He writes, "For me art is like being lost without a sense of destination. Never quite sure whether I’ve gone too far, or not quite far enough. Fumbling in the dark for that map, that feeling of found. Its less about where you’re going and more about realizing that moment where you’re at.

It is my intention to create a piece that encapsulates not the similarities but the small disparities that make the site at Pritchard Park almost human. The history gone and grown over that continues to affect both the landscape of the future and the future of the landscape."

Publicity in Seattle Times

2005-09-11T07:26:00.000-07:00

This article was printed in the Friday, September 9, 2005 Ticket section of the Seattle Times and can be found online at http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?slug=visarts09&date=20050909&query=collocation

A Bainbridge park as archaeological tour

by Lucia Enriquez

Special to the Seattle Times

A wedge of Scotch broom that Gregory Glynn has cut by hand lies in the middle of a swath where he has cleared, then gathered and compressed the invasive plant. Situated in a clearing with spectacular views, Glynn's "Foundation" is wavy and organic at the top where branches have dried up, neat as a slice where the cut ends face. "Foundation's" dual nature reflects both the beauty and problems addressed by "Collocation," an exhibit in Bainbridge Island's Pritchard Park.

Pritchard Park is a 50-acre area with beach access, forests and panoramic views. Formerly a dwelling area for Native Americans and then an industrial site with worker housing, it was closed because of contamination. Cleanup is nearly complete, and the park opened again just last year, except for a few areas.

A trust has bought half the park and is raising funds to buy the entire site, with a portion allocated as a memorial for Japanese-American internees. According to exhibit curator Kristin Tollefson, "within Pritchard Park we see co-existences of lush growth and decay, and we know of a complicated and painful history coupled with insurgent hope for future use."

Exhibit review

"Collocation" dusk to dawn daily through Sept. 24, Pritchard Park, Bainbridge Island (www.artshum.org/community/pubart/pritchard).

Going through the exhibit is refreshingly not like viewing art in a gallery, but a kind of archaeological exercise as art gets revealed at the end of trails. Pieces exist in subtle juxtaposition with vegetation, terrain or the remains of dwellings. Artifacts left from previous use lie alongside art, enigmatic in and of themselves: a fire hydrant, a porcelain toilet, a gatepost.

In Melanie Noel's "ghostrain," white paper foldouts printed with fragments of a poem act like signposts for a journey. They are hung throughout the park under the shadows of trees, inside the wreck of a car, along a chain-link fence surrounding a still-contaminated area. Unfortunately, the ones hanging along the fence had been set on fire, an act of vandalism that sadly took advantage of the piece's vulnerability.

Interspersed with discarded roof shingles are Polly Purvis' photo paper printouts of dance figures. Looking like angels dancing on a mound, there's an otherworldly quality to this piece. By infusing discards with art, Purvis counteracts our culture's impulse to throw things away and instead creates sacred space.

Participation with place inevitably includes deterioration, but often this process imparts an unexpected sense of beauty. The firm of rbf architecture simulates this concept in "align," a row of oil-drum lids on the forest floor. Swirls of orange rust pop visually against green vegetation. Impeccably queued, they follow a slope that leads to a cliff, as if undertaking an eternal march.

Diana Liljelund and Perri Lynch book-end the show with pieces that also make the most visual impact. Liljelund's "The Immigrant" is a madrona tree from inland that had died and was transported and painted lacquer red. Looking like an artery drawing blood from the sky, the piece is bold but emotionally unsettling.

Lynch's piece is the most ambitious in scale and concept, rigorous and wonderfully successful. Sited on the beach area, Lynch's grid of industrial-height plastic tubes resonates with the verticality of the forest and with the masts of boats in the nearby marina. Topped with white flags, the regimented poles echo gravestones and reflect a sense of loss. On the gravel foundation, briar flowers offer a token of grace. Wander amid this forest of tubes and listen to the wind blowing through — an artistic cry for balance longs to be heard.

rbf architects' align

2005-09-06T00:47:00.000-07:00

align is the first work approached in the wooded loop path portion of the installation. One comes upon it both suddenly and subtly: at the descending gentle incline on the trail, the work surfaces on the left, an oxidized punctuation in the green of the ivy groundcover.

This work is more about punctuation than sentence, to continue the literary metaphor. The work adorns the site, and directs it, these oil drum lids marking measured intervals from a subterranean starting point in a brushy undergrown spot farther up the hill to the bottom of a steep dropoff aiming toward the EPA site, formerly the Wycoff Creosote Plant.

The work is open to interpretation, but there are elements to note as fact: the oil drum lids were installed clean and bright and silver-colored in the landscape, completely level and strictly measured to step equally on center to the North. And over the duration of the exhibit, the work has encountered its own chaos: rain helping to oxidize the lids to a fiery rust, animals and wind shifting the horizontal lids off their bamboo stands, plants and people going over the line. This piece continues to reveal more of its message as it lives on in the space.

rbf Architects also worked as a team in the manner they conduct their architectural work, by consultation, contradiction, and supportive exchange. The result is a collaborative piece in the best sense of the word.

Gregory Glynn's Foundation

2005-08-31T15:13:00.000-07:00

Gregory is one of the most focused artists I have met. We first worked together during the Art in the Meadow installation at Blakely Harbor two years ago, and would frequently run into each other at all hours of the day as he was raking vast mounds of cut grass into timber forms for his meadow piece. He is a hard worker and meets his work in an all-consuming physical way, whether methodically cutting and reassembling old growth logs for studio work, or tackling the sprawling ivy eradication project spearheaded by IslandWood.

And so with Foundation, his work was true to this form. Gregory had proposed building a dwelling out of scotch broom on a portion of the park that is perched high above the water, with views up to Mount Baker and down to Mount Rainier. It was to be a commentary about the site, its history as a residential area for creosote plant workers, its future as a green space accessible to all types of humanity, and its proximity to pricy homes with similar vistas.

As artwork does evolve through its emergent process, so did Gregory's, and the depth to which the actual piece touches on many issues surrounding struggles between humans and their landscapes became vast. When you approach the work on its dogleg away from the loop trail, you first see the clearing. This site was entirely populated by scotch broom at the outset of the exhibit, and Gregory cleared it by hand (along with two other significant patches of broom at other points on the site). The broom was laid in a methodical, stacking pattern to form a literal square footage of a foundation for a home, and over the first weeks of the installation, the branches wilted and the stack compressed. It now holds the weight of anyone who wishes to climb on it.

Further up the hill is the prime viewpoint, the sought after place at which one sees the surrounding Puget Sound. And the paradox is that Gregory has also made it into the viewpoint into a cleared section around three historic trees that were girdled -- a process in which external bark and cambium is systematically removed, here by a machete -- and left to die where they were rooted. The viewer is forced to consider a much darker side to the desire for ownership over territory.

Gregory's writes "Natural materials such as wood, stone, water, and vegetation are elements most often used in my sculpture. I’m interested in creating simple forms that explore a complex dichotomy of strength and vulnerability existing in nature. Inviting impermanence, factors such as time, weather, and the process of decay enable nature, the supreme sculptor, to have a final hand in the life cycle of each piece. My process is often physical and laborious but it is through work that I discover interesting problems are created and solved. Ultimately, my intention is to make artworks that evoke a sense of connection between us and this world which we exist.

Constructed from the invasive Scotch Broom that sprawls rampantly throughout Pritchard Park, Foundation is represented by a stacked footprint of a house. Spectacular views of Seattle, Puget Sound and Eagle Harbor can be appreciated here and offer an opportunity to reflect on recent occurrences and those that happened in years past."

Look for an article in this weekend's Islander about Gregory and his work, by Lin Kamer-Walker.

Melanie Noel's ghostrain

2005-08-30T22:31:00.000-07:00

The Pritchard Park site is such a layered experience, it is impossible to capture a round view of the place strictly through the language of visual artwork. Melanie is a poet, and distinguished in that fact alone. But add to the mix her experience with sound and performance, her quiet incisiveness and ability to sustain a dialog, and her love of words, and she compels her way into the fabric of this show.

Simply put, Melanie conducted historic and firsthand information about the site, and she grew a poem from these seeds. The poem was then fragmented in various ways and the fragments were transcribed onto vellum and folded into small (about 1-2 inch) open cubes which were suspended throughout the site. Some of the cubic lanterns are marked with trail and name markers, others are meant to be discovered by attentive visitors to the site. At two points -- hanging under a non-native redwood tree's glorious canopy and sitting in a derelict abandoned car -- viewers are able to see the poem flat, in its entirety.

I include here at closing words about the site that Melanie wrote while working on the poem, as well as her statement about more of the intention behind the piece.

"It is unusual somehow, the park, the illicitness of so much of [the park's] social
life, and the incredible mix of beauty that supports that - it's like
shallow loam full of flowers on an island of bones somehow. There is
something there - that a little quince orchard can co-exist with an old
lamp cover - something boundless and bound up at the same time."

"ghostrain is inspired by Chilean poet and artist Cecilia Vicuna's, visual poems she calls "metaphors in space."

'Precarios is what is obtained by prayer. Uncertain, exposed to hazards, insecure. From the Latin pecarius, from precis; prayer. The word oir (to hear) was originally the same word orar (to pray). Reciprocity. By praying you reconnect.'

ghostrain is a single poem spread throughout Pritchard Park in white boxes, some tangled together and some hanging alone. The words are on the inside. They are a precarios of history, imagination and language; of their ability to migrate and dwell together, and find their place in a context of invisible integrity."

Diana Liljelund's The Immigrant

2005-08-29T07:04:00.000-07:00

As you approach the bottom of Creosote Place the stunningly unobstructed water and city view opens up on your right. Tucked into the southeastern corner of this open space is Diana Liljelund's piece, the Immigrant.

It is a red tree, bright and slick at the water's edge. This dead madrona was given to Diana by Art Koura, an old time Bainbridge Islander. With determination and community help, Diana painted the trunk and much of the branch system by hand before it was trucked to the site and cast into a concrete base. Now the trunk lists gently eastward, gesturing toward Seattle or points beyond. Best viewed from the ferry approaching or leaving Eagle Harbor, the trunk alternately leaps out from the green backdrop or blends unnoticed.

Diana's words about her work and the Immigrant read:
“Trees and the forest invoke wonder and inspiration for me. Within a painting I try to create a place: a translation of a moment in time that I have experienced and wish to share. I work with many layers of color and their interralationships, spatial depth and structure to create a composed narrative. The installations are created through a process of a working dialogue with a place, and what is found there to be celebrated, unearthed, and given new life.

A graceful dead Madrone tree has moved from five miles inland to quietly establish a new and unexpected identity on the beach which challenges known truths. The synthetic red of the poised tree framed by the sweeping soft green curve of the forest edge creates an arrangement suspended in the brevity of the moment inspired by the ancient art of Ikebana. Celebrating the link between man and nature ‘the Immigrant’ creates a new life for itself and in doing so affirms a new balance in the environment around it."

More about Diana's work can be found at www.dianaliljelund.com.

Introduction to Artist Profiles

2005-08-11T07:07:00.000-07:00

It has been a month of tomorrows...

Following over the next days I'll feature a post on each individual artist in the Collocation exhibit. The sequence will procede in order of the numbered progression referred to on the map that is available on this blog and at the site.

By entering the park via the Creosote Place entrance at the end of Eagle Harbor Drive, viewers will see the show in the order that was intended by this curator. That said, the joy of the installation is its ability to surprise even the most conditioned visitor to the site. Time, weather, light, and circumstance illuminate the work in new ways. Plants have grown up, people have tramped down the trails, the exchange between organic and imposed continues.

As such, I encourage multiple and frequent viewings.

underway

2005-07-10T16:19:00.000-07:00

We are underway with Collocation, and the response has been overwhelmingly positive. People have ventured to the park and made discoveries of art and the unbelievable context in which it sits. Any feedback on negotiating the park or the site is welcome here... the work is constantly evolving.

The work featured here gives another taste of the array of artists' work to be seen at the park: Gregory Glynn's scotch broom Foundation, a detail of Polly Purvis' roofing mound with dancing skeletons, Perri Lynch's Floating Datum poles, the darkly textured monolith constructed by Dan Linz, here behind a strip of barbed wire, and Amanda Sturgeon's meandering rock wall abutting the chain link of the EPA site. Thanks to Perri Lynch for the photos of her work, Gregory's and Dan's. If anyone has other photos of the installation, please email them and I will add as I can.

We are starting to hear publicity in the media about the show as well. In ArtAccess, a fabulous free Northwest gallery guide (and more!) published by Debbi Lester, you can find the Collocation map as a color centerpiece in the July/August issue. And yesterday, on Saturday, July 9, we were featured on the front page of the Bainbridge Review in a lovely article on Collocation written by Tina Lieu accompanied by photos taken by Jesse Beals. You can see it online at www.bainbridgereview.com in the community section.

Starting tomorrow, I will be featuring the work of each of the participating artists on an individual blog page. You can meet the artists themselves and hear them talk about their work at a public event on August 11, here on Bainbridge, moderated by Greg Bell of 4Culture. Stay tuned for more details about this and other related community events.

Map of the ArtSite at Pritchard Park

2005-07-03T13:44:00.000-07:00

We enjoyed a community celebration in honor of the opening of the exhibit yesterday, and Collocation is now officially open for business.

Here is a map of the site for reference if you come for a visit. Click on the image to get a larger version of it on your screen.

Please note that there are two works on the land behind the beach, and nine works up in the woods. The woodland pieces are marked by pin flags on a loop trail. To get to the beach, come from the parking lot at the base of Creosote Lane, around the chain link fence, and along the EPA site on the dirt access road. Alternately, you can come from the Taylor Avenue entrance to the park and access the beach that way.

Each work is indicated at the site by a round name marker that is numbered to correspond to the sequencing on the map, and each will soon be accompanied by a description the artist's intent.

on the view from here

2005-06-29T17:41:00.000-07:00

As I write this, I'm on the ferry heading for Seattle. It is just after 5:30pm and the light is fantastic at the end of a glorious day. I'm looking off to the South at Pritchard Park, and I can see Perri Lynch's Floating Datum piece. The low sun is catching the sea of windsocks and glinting off the poles. I think I see the low rumble of Amanda Sturgeon's rock wall leaning up against the corner of the EPA chainlink, and then we round the corner toward Rockaway Beach. Diana Liljelund's red madrona is backlit and shifts from red to black silhouette to almost invisible. Gregory Glynn's Foundation is only visible at this angle by what isn't there; the air in the woods that is light and open up on the hill. I'm struck by how his piece is mirrored in the brazen new construction to the south of the park, a future home shaving the side of the steep bank and buttressed with tons of concrete.

The photos here show glimpses of all work mentioned above except for Amanda's; over the next weeks, look for images and words about all of the work in the show.

from the beginning...

2005-06-27T20:55:00.000-07:00

Just days away from the official opening, it feels right to start at the beginning of the process evolving with the Collocation temporary art installation at Pritchard Park.

The place we are working holds an unbelievable array of definitions: a glorious stretch of unheard-of-in-these-parts undeveloped sandy beach tucked into a verdant hill; the former Wycoff log creosoting plant; the coming site of the Nidoto Nai Yoni/Let it not happen again Nikkei Internment and Exclusion Memorial; a former full-blown town called Creosote, complete with dance hall, post office, public baths and workers' cottages; an EPA superfund site; clandestine destination for island youth; site-specific art installation.

This litany is, in a way, a metaphor for the strange and complicated relationship shared between people and the land: a drama of control.

I imagine that those who are reading this have some interest in the Collocation project already. But I also imagine that these people are as complex as the site, each of whom has a different story that ties them to the project, or to the place. Hence the name Collocation: to arrange or place together. It is the most we can do to acknowledge the complexity, and to contain it only in naming it.

I'm keeping the blog more or less as a journal for the project, with the hope that the public nature of this work dovetails with the public forum generated in a blog. I spread some words, others help to grow them into conversation.

Here are a few photos of the initial walk through the site we conducted early in June, during which artists came to look for places that might inspire their work.

Michelle & Bobby at the big leaf maple

2005-06-27T06:52:00.000-07:00

We'll start with a bite of the present, and then catch up in the next posting with photos from over the past month at Pritchard Park.

Exhibit construction and installation is underway this week, June 26 through July 2, the day of the opening of the exhibit.

Collocation Art Installation

2005-06-22T08:55:00.000-07:00

Collocation is a site-specific art installation unfolding at Bainbridge Island's
Pritchard Park between July 2 and September 24, 2005. Eleven works constructed about, from and for the site by artists from Seattle and Bainbridge Island will coexist on the eastern portion of this 50 acre piece of land located at the southeast edge of Eagle Harbor.

Collocation serves as an indicator and reminder of the tension inherent in human participation with place.  Within Pritchard Park we see coexistences of lush growth and decay, and we know of a complicated and painful history coupled with insurgent hope for future use.  The artists working on this project candidly reveal many of these facets through their work. Viewers are invited to walk the site and collect their own firsthand information as they experience both place and created installation.

Collocation participants include Michelle Arab, Gregory Glynn, Diana Liljelund, Dan Linz, Perri Lynch, Melanie Noel, Polly Purvis, RBF Architects, Amanda Sturgeon, Kristin Tollefson and Ruthie Tomlinson, and is curated by Kristin Tollefson.