Artist Talks @ Bunnell

August 28, 2020- Inspiration and Adaptation: "R.A.C.E.S. Story Circle" with Skywalker Payne

Skywalker Payne’s work embraces her experience as a professional oral storyteller, performance artist, author, poet, nurse, and healer. She is leading a new workshop model called R.A.C.E.S. (Race A Concept Explored in Story Circle). Built upon her storytelling experience, knowledge of Black history and racism, Skywalker found storytelling an effective method to communicate difficult feelings and experiences. The goal is to establish R.A.C.E.S. Circle as a model to enable anyone to rise above limiting racial concepts. This tool can be used in businesses or organizations to explore race in a non-threatening, non-judgemental, empathetic space. Bunnell's board and staff participated in a R.A.C.E.S workshop last month and and some will be joining us on Zoom for our conversation. more.

August 21, 2020- Inspiration and Adaptation: "Art in the Anthropocene" with Sheryl Reily and Nina Elder

Born in New Zealand, Sheryl Maree Reily lives in the small mining town of Ester. The gravity of the global situation prompted her to transform her creative practice as a self- taught photographer and healthcare professional into an arts-based advocacy for human and environmental wellbeing. Her work draws upon an expanded field of sculpture, performance, installation, and media technology. Reily has received three Rasmuson Foundation individual artist awards, Helene Wurlitzer Foundation and Santa Fe Art Institute Fellowships, and serves on the Alaska State Council for the Arts Visual Arts Committee, and with the Emily Tremaine Foundation's Artists Thrive platform.

Artist and researcher Nina Elder creates projects that reveal humanity’s dependence on, and interruption of, the natural world. With a focus on changing cultures and ecologies, Nina advocates for collaboration, fostering relationships between institutions, artists, scientists and diverse communities. She lectures as a visiting artist/scholar at universities, develops publicly engaged programs, and consults with organizations that seek to grow through interdisciplinary programming. Nina’s artwork is widely exhibited and has been featured in Art in America, VICE Magazine, and on PBS. She is based in Albuquerque, New Mexico. more.

 

August 14, 2020- Inspiration and Adaptation: "Art in the Anthropocene" w/ Scott McDonald, Anvil Catlin Williamson, Sheila Wyne and Michael Conti

Scott McDonald an artist, an art educator, and a lifetime resident of Alaska. He teaches K-6 art for Anchorage School District as well as an active studio practice in both Homer and Anchorage.

Anvil Catlin Williamson was born and raised in Spokane, WA but has been a permanent resident of Fairbanks, Alaska since 2008. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from The University of Alaska Fairbanks in 2016 and has been a full-time artist since 2017.

Sheila Wyne is a visual artist based in Anchorage. Her studio work has been shown across the state, the Lower 48 and overseas. Her work is in permanent collections of several Alaska museums, and she has designed over 20 public artworks.

Michael Conti is a photographer, filmmaker and printmaker living and working on the land of the Dena’ina people in Anchorage Alaska. He is also a professor of photography at the University of Alaska Anchorage. more.

July 3, 2020- July First Friday Artist Talk w/ Steven Godfrey

Steven Godfrey is a potter and a Professor of Ceramics at the University of Alaska Anchorage. His current work is less about being tailored for a specific utilitarian function but rather to illustrate a collection of his interests, combined during the making process and meant to speak beyond functionality and tell a story through the symbolism of form and color. The forms he makes emulate the elegance of French automobile bodies made during the 1930s and 40s: Delage, Delahaye, Talbot-Lago, Bugatti, Avions Voison, etc. Other aspects of his work subtly or directly depict his interest in old New England tobacco barns, Native Alaskan ivory bird carvings, children’s book illustrations, Danish furniture, magpies, architecture.” He lives in Anchorage. more

July 3, 2020- July First Friday Artist Talk with David Pettibone

“Nature has always been the thread that sews my paintings together. Instead of being a part of nature, we see ourselves as existing in tandem with it: separate but together. This is, of course, an illusion. The complexities of our relationship with nature are infinite and they run the gamut from peaceful to the sublime and from pleasant to the horrifying. My work explores the many levels of our relationship with nature and seeks to convey the visceral emotions that come about when we are reminded of just how connected to our environment we truly are.” David lives in Homer. more

August 8, 2020- August First Friday Artist Talk w/Steven Gordon & Anvil Catlin Williamson

Steven Gordon is an Anchorage artist painting the landscape of south central Alaska for the past 35 years in a painterly realist style. He went to Dartmouth college and then earned this MFA from the university of Iowa in 1984 and headed up to Alaska to start his adventures with the life and land of Alaska. He’s taught at UAA and APU and had done numerous painting workshops, and artist-in-the-school residencies across the state. His work can be seen in many private, public and corporate collections.

Anvil Catlin Williamson was born and raised in Spokane, WA but has been a permanent resident of Fairbanks, Alaska since 2008. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from The University of Alaska Fairbanks in 2016 and has been a full-time artist since 2017. Utilizing animal imagery combined with non-organic components, Anvil’s ceramic and mixed-media sculptures explore the roles of suffering and empathy in the individual life. This current body of work entitled “Shelter” delves into our human need for safety as well as community. All of us have recently experienced changes in how we relate to our physical and emotional shelters in the shadow of current events. The subjects you see represent individuals struggling to find or provide shelter amidst the various forms of isolation that often come with it. more.

August 7, 2020- Land Acknowledgement Series, Part 5: Acknowledgement in Action w/ with Melissa Shaginoff, Sally Ash & Syverine Bentz

Melissa Shaginoff (Ahtna, Piaute) discusses an ephemeral land marking project, “Acknowledgement in Action.” Original place names, art, language and science intersect. She was joined by special guests Sally Ash, Sugt’estun language teacher in Nanwalek and Syverine Bentz, the Kachemak Bay Research Reserve’s Education Coordinator. more

July 31, 2020- Land Acknowledgement Series, Part 4: Indigenizing Monuments with Joel Isaak & Ruth Miller

Joel Isaak's family is from the village of Ch’aghałnikt (Point Possession) and currently lives in Soldotna. His Dena’ina name, Łiq’a yes, translates to salmon skin which relates to his pursuits of learning fish skin sewing. Joel is an artist, educator and lifelong learner. He uses art to uncover understanding of working in an educational environment where he combines the Western education model with traditional Alaska Native ways of life. Language work inspires Joel’s artistic practice and education methodology. He uses multi-cultural communication as a medium to aid in language revitalization. Art has served as a safeguard for him and a medium for generating understanding and communicating hard truths to a wide range of audiences to help facilitate wellness.

 

We also welcomed special guest Ruth Miller to this conversation. Ruth Miller is a Dena’ina Athabaskan woman who was born and raised in Alaska and currently lives in Anchorage. Her family on her maternal side is from the village of Ekuk in Bristol Bay. She claims Russian Jewish heritage from her Father’s side. She is a climate activist, Indigenous rights advocate, traditional beadwork artist, storyteller, and singer. She is also on the path of becoming a traditional healer. She is a recent graduate of Brown University and received a BA in Critical Development Studies with a focus on Indigenous resistance and liberation. She believes that the true liberation of Indigenous peoples must begin with a deep spiritual foundation in the wisdom of the ancestors, and knowledge of how to live in harmony and respect with the lands, waters, plants, and animal relatives. This means honoring the power of cultural bonds, the strength of healthy communities, and the beauty of Indigenous lifeways and artforms. (Bio from https://sustainus.org/people/ruth-miller/). more.

July 24, 2020- Land Acknowledgement Series, Part 3: Marking Tuggeht, an Indigenous Land-Acknowledgement Initiative with Argent Kvasnikoff and civic partners

A conversation about a community process of education and transparency in decision-making about land acknowledgement, Asia hosts civic leaders and artist, Argent Kvasnikoff for an open dialogue about marking Tuggeht as Indigenous land with Ivan Encelewsk (CEO, Ninilchik Village Tribe) Donna Aderhold (Homer City Council) Marianne Aplin (US Fish and Wildlife, Islands and Ocean Visitors Center) Matt Steffy (Homer Parks Maintenance Coordinator), Julie Engebretsen (Homer Planning Department), Deb Lowney (PARC Committee) and Robert Archibald (PARC Committee), Rika Mouw (Landscape Architect). more.

July 17, 2020- Land Acknowledgement Series, Part 2: ``Where We Begin: Tuggeght, At the Shore``

Features guests Emily Johnson and Amber Webb. This conversation will be centered around learning about land acknowledgement

Amber Webb is an artist & activist from Dillingham, Alaska of Yup’ik and Unangan heritage. She received a Rasmuson Individual Artist Award and a Project Award. Amber explores pictorial Yup’ik storytelling to tell contemporary stories of oppression and resilience.

Emily Johnson is an artist who makes body-based work. A Bessie Award-winning choreographer and a 2015 Guggenheim fellow in choreography, she is based in New York. Raised in Soldotna, Alaska, she is of Yup’ik descent. more.