California Walkscapes
Leeza Doreian, All Day Soft Light
Opening Reception:
October 5th, 2018 6-9pm
Exhibition Dates:
October 5th – November 4th, 2018
Walkshop One: Collecting Shadows with Emily Gui
October 6th, 2018 2-4pm
Walkshop Two: You are the Measure with Laura Elayne Miller
October 20th, 2018 2-4pm
Walkshop Three: Made Land with Daniel Southard
November 3rd, 2018 2-5pm
When we walk our bodies get exposed to innumerous stimuli. Supported by our senses, we enter a field that requires us to constantly adapt to the changing environment and generate meaning that allows us to create knowledge needed to continue traversing streets, alleys, roads, and other passageways opening up in front of us. Whether in a city or rural landscape, through the act of walking, the physical, topographical and socio cultural layout of the environment we live in is understood experientially. Inspired by Francesco Careri’s publication Walkscapes this exhibit asks what information can we unearth about the California landscape through the act of walking? California Walkscapes showcase artists from all genres who respond to walking from a number of different perspectives – for example, considering walking in the context of the body, urbanity, place and migration. Be ready for a mixed-media exhibition encompassing the genres of visual, performance, video, installation, and sound art. Stay connected for upcoming walkshops that will be integrated into the programming throughout the duration of the exhibition.
Participating Artists
Liat Berdugo
Mary Campbell
Gina Chiao
Rebekah Dean
Leeza Doreian
Laura Elayne Miller
Olga Evanusa-Rowland
Emily Gui
Susanne Huth
Carey Lin & Gabriel Gilder
Erica Molesworth
Kelley O’Leary
Daniel Southard
Chris Thorson
Kevin Welch
Michal Wisniowski
Minoosh Zomorrodinia
Curated by Astrid Kaemmerling, Ph.D
Astrid Kaemmerling, Ph.D. is a german-born artist, researcher, curator and educator based in San Francisco, CA. Her work as interdisciplinary artist spans the genres of visual, performance and media art and strives to connect place memories of the past, such as collected travel experiences, with a critical exploration of specific neighborhoods and selected urban places. Kaemmerling has been exhibited internationally in Germany, Italy, Korea and the United States. Kaemmerling’s work won several residency fellowships, such as at the Cittadellarte-Fondazione Pistoletto, Italy, the Vermont Studio Center, VT, Enos Park Artist Residency, Springfield, IL and KALA Art Institute, CA. She is the founder of The Walk Discourse, a Bay Area based laboratory for walking artists and walking enthusiasts to share walking art methodologies, practices and tools. The interest in interdisciplinary collaboration has led her to the College of Fine Arts at Ohio University where she received her Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary Arts; a degree positioned at the intersection of art & research. She specializes in the domain of walking art; her writing has been published in peer-reviewed journals and publications. Current artistic research projects include a series of works that investigate “processes of home-building” together with poet Rebecca J.R. Lachman.
The Walk Discourse
The walk discourse is a laboratory for walking artists and walking enthusiasts to share walking art methodologies, practices and tools. The Walk Discourse is motivated by the urge to create a San Francisco/ Bay Area based community of fellow walking artists and researchers. At the core of the network is the belief that we have to invest in the place we live in through playful and experimental (social) art that can lead to a change in perception and allow for the creation of a sense of place. The Walk Discourse is intended to support local emerging walking artists and researchers to connect, exchange and mature, as well as provide a local framework that encourages contact with national and international walking art communities. The project aims to connect artists, researchers, and participants in meaningful and practice-related/experimental manners to promote walking art, walking art research, as well as the generation and creation of new & innovative walking art projects.
Click here for information about The Walk Discourse
For more information about the exhibition and Incline Gallery, please contact Shirin Makaremi at inclinegallerysf@gmail.com.
Walkshop One: Collecting Shadows with Emily Gui
Saturday, October 6th, 2018 2-4pm
Join California Walkscapes artist Emily Gui and curator Astrid Kaemmerling for a walk to collect shadows from around the Mission neighborhood. Emily will briefly discuss the history of the cyanotype and then distribute light sensitive paper that can be used to collect existing shadows. After walking, we will develop and discuss the prints which will eventually be installed in the gallery for the remainder of the show. No experience necessary! Emily’s installation displays a selection of shadow prints collected this month from walks taken around San Francisco.
RSVP to thewalkdiscourse@gmail.com and let us know you will be walking with us
Location: Incline Gallery
Duration: 2h
Equipment: Comfortable shoes, water & snacks, sunscreen
Walkshop Two: You are the Measure with Laura Elayne Miller
October 20th, 2018 2-4pm
You Are The Measure explores the act of walking and our relationship to our surroundings through a conceptual strategy game. A pair of dice are used based on a complimentary diagram: one expresses the 6 qualities of physical space, and the other expresses the 6 qualities of perceived space. When the dice are tossed, the relationship between the two are used to determine a unique holistic experience of space & place.
For the California Walkscapes exhibition I propose a weekend afternoon Walkshop where I will lead a group through an experience of space in a neighborhood near the gallery. Using the dice, we will explore place through the chance combinations we toss. Additionally, each participant will receive a simple zine in which they may document their findings and experiences. Through a guided walk, participants will also be prompted to use their cell phones to collect sound and images, have pencils and paper zines, as well as use other methods to document their exploration. The Walkshop is intended to be both an individual experience and a group activity. All ages welcome.
RSVP to thewalkdiscourse@gmail.com and let us know you will be walking with us
Location: Incline Gallery
Duration: 2h
Equipment: Comfortable shoes, water & snacks, sunscreen
Walkshop Three: Made Land with Daniel Southard
November 3rd, 2018 2-5pm
Debris: Homes and stores, industry, military. Cracked, dis-integrated, re-integrated into land, new land, as the exoskeletons and bones of our ancestors once slowly built land from the bottom of the ocean. Contamination: plutonium, lead, polychlorinated biphenyls – byproducts of humanity’s craze to create life from death, stability from threat. Each fragment tells a story: its own story, or the stories we tell to make these places seem like real places, these pieces seem alive. If man is the creator and destroyer of worlds, then this place represents humankind’s acceleration of geological time, with land built and strata created, followed by submergence all in a matter of decades instead of epochs: this crazy Anthropocene.
When the land itself is created out of bay and marsh from human debris from other places, contaminated by industry and the distant geopolitical events of the nuclear age, when its very existence is threatened by planet-wide human behavior causing sea level rise, what meaning does the land contain? The most basic unit of humanity’s relationship to the earth becomes vague and slippery and takes on new meanings.
We will examine these issues through an artistic and historical lens, taking a clear eyed view of the depth and beauty of the seemingly mundane. This walk is an urban hike which will explore the newest area of fill-created land in San Francisco, a quiet and unsung zone that is rapidly changing. We will begin near housing projects, and then hug the shoreline in the EPA Superfund Site and into the State Park, examining the exposed fill as it spills out of the banks of the bayshore. Participants will have a chance to collect their own pieces of the fill, imagining ways to give these objects new lives as artifacts.
RSVP to thewalkdiscourse@gmail.com and let us know you will be walking with us
Where: The hike will leave from Gilman Playground on Gilman Ave. and Griffith St. in the Bayview and end at Candlestick Point. Rides will be available back to the starting point.
Please bring sturdy shoes you don’t mind getting dirty, long pants, and gloves for handling the fill. Rain or shine!
Duration: 3h
An artist-made publication will be provided.
