THIS LAND IS…

The James Pearson Duffy Department of Art and Art History, Elaine L. Jacob Gallery, Wayne State University, Detroit, is pleased to present THIS LAND IS…, October 25 through December 13, 2019. 

THIS LAND IS… features works created through a wide variety of disciplines by artists who address current and future environmental concerns.  The artists confront political, cultural, and social ecological changes by observing sentimental landmarks and documenting their importance. This exhibition was curated by Jennifer Belair Sakarian and includes works by the following artists: David Buckley Borden and Casey Keenan, Sophie-Madeleine Jaillet, Sarah Anne Johnson, and Margaret Laurena Kemp in collaboration with Gina Kalabishis.

Exhibiting Artists:

David Buckley Borden:<http://davidbuckleyborden.com/>
Casey Keenan: <https://www.gravitywavestudios.com>
Sophie-Madeleine Jaillet: <https://www.sophiemadeleinejaillet.com/>
Sarah Anne Johnson: <https://sarahannejohnson.ca/>
Margaret Laurena Kemp: <http://www.mlkemp.space> 
Gina Kalabishis: <https://ginakalabishis.com>

Special programming coinciding with the exhibition included a gallery talk by David Buckley Borden and collaborator Casey Keenan, and Margaret Laurena Kemp, Thursday, October 24; and a performance by Margaret Laurena Kemp, Friday, October 25.  The talk and performance were held at the Elaine L. Jacob Gallery, WSU.  

The James Pearson Duffy Department of Art and Art History is a division of Wayne State’s College of Fine, Performing and Communication Arts, educating the next generation of visual artists, designers and art historians. Wayne State University, located in the heart of Detroit’s midtown cultural center, is a premier urban research university offering more than 350 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to more than 28,000 students. 

Biographies:

David Buckley Borden is a Cambridge MA-based interdisciplinary artist and designer. Using an accessible combination of art and design, David promotes a shared environmental awareness and heightened cultural value of ecology. David's place-based projects highlight both pressing environmental issues and everyday phenomena. Informed by research and community outreach, David's work manifests in a variety of forms, ranging from site-specific landscape installations in the woods to data-driven cartography in the gallery. 

David was a 2016/2017 Charles Bullard Fellow (Artist-in-Residence) at the Harvard Forest where he answered the question, “How can art and design foster cultural cohesion around environmental issues and help inform ecology-minded decision making?” As a Harvard Forest Associate Fellow David continues to collaborate with Harvard researchers, to champion a cultural ecology supported by interdisciplinary science-communication. 

David studied landscape architecture at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design and worked as a designer at Sasaki Associates and Ground before focusing his independent practice at the intersection of landscape, creativity, and cultural event. 

Casey N Keenan (collaborator with David Buckley Borden) is a musician and sound artist with albums released on Drag City and Slumberland Records. A multi-instrumentalist, composer, and sound designer, Keenan’s recent projects include a documentary with Harvard Forest, a collaborative art film with David Buckley Borden, and a series of musical themes inspired by his lifelong love of astrophysics. A native of Bath, Maine, Keenan can now be found at his Gravity Wave Studios in Cambridge, MA.

Sophie-Madeleine Jaillet is an artist and a rock collector from Montréal, Québec. Through obsessive observation, scientific methodology, fieldwork, and sculptural experiments, Jaillet explores her human finitude in a state of geological awareness. Her practice underlines the ungraspable nature of geological and climatological processes, as well as highlights the limits of human perception when attempting to engage with large-scale occurrences. Jaillet’s recent work is the result of a research-based studio practice, in which she manipulates and speculates about the materials of the Anthropocene.  Over the past two years, she participated in several artists residencies (Banff, Joggins, and Saint-Jean-Port-Joli) in order to situate her practice within the various Canadian climates and landscapes. Sophie Madeleine Jaillet holds a BFA from Concordia University (Montréal, 2013) and a MFA from NSCAD UNIVERSITY (Halifax, 2016).

Sarah Anne Johnson was born in 1976 in Winnipeg, Manitoba. She received her BFA from the University of Manitoba and completed her MFA at The Yale School of Art. Johnson’s work has been exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions internationally. She is the recipient of numerous grants and awards and is included in several distinguished collections. Currently, she lives in Winnipeg. She is represented by Julie Saul Gallery in New York, Stephen Bulger in Toronto, and Division Gallery in Montreal.  

Margaret Laurena Kemp is a multi-disciplinary performing artist and theatre educator, investigating authorship and spatial politics through performance. Recently, she has performed in Northern California's The Montalvo Arts Center and B Street Theatre. She was awarded a 2017 performance residency at The Headlands (USA). Within her performance practice, Kemp is interested in questioning how systems of scientific and social engineering manipulate voice, breath, flesh, communities and the natural world. She is a native of Dorchester, Massachusetts and currently resides in Davis, California. Kemp has performed nationally and internationally at such venues as Beyond Baroque Arts Center (Los Angeles, California); The Magnet Theatre (Cape Town, South Africa); Theatre of Changes (Athens, Greece); La Mama Theatre (Melbourne, Australia); and Red Pear Theatre (Antibes, France). Recent film releases include "Dark Rite" (2016) and a critically acclaimed starring role in the film "Children of God". Kemp currently teaches at UC Davis Arts in California.

Gina Kalabishis  lives and works in Melbourne, Australia. Kalabishis holds a Post Graduate Diploma of Visual Arts from the Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne University and an Advanced Diploma of Arts, Victoria University. Kalabishis’s practice spans painting, drawing, sculptural arrangements, photography and digital collage exploring philosophical and emotional relationships with the natural world and our pursuit to live in equal harmony in the age of the anthropocene. 

Her work is featured in the award winning publication NATIVE: Art and Design with Australian Plants, published by Thames & Hudson and had multiple residencies at Bundanon Trust Studios NSW 2016-2017 and The Harry Brookes Allen Museum for Anatomy and Pathology, Melbourne University 2013-14. 

Kalabishis has featured in numerous solo and group exhibitions and is represented in major national and international collections. Gina Kalabishis is represented by Flinders Lane Gallery, Melbourne Australia.