Spill: Alaskan artists remember
By: LINDA ROBINSON, Outreach Coordinator
In 2008, Homer’s Bunnell Street Gallery, in cooperation with the citizens’ council, invited artists to participate in a show titled “Spill”. The concept behind “Spill“ was to provide an opportunity for artists to express the impacts of the Exxon Valdez oil spill through their chosen media. Thirty-three finalists were chosen, mostly from Alaska.
The show opened at the Bunnell Street Gallery in Homer on March 24, 2009, the 20th Anniversary of the Exxon Valdez spill. The show travelled to the Baranov Museum in Kodiak, the Cordova Historical Museum and the Artworks Gallery in Soldotna before ending its tour of Alaska at the MTS Gallery in Anchorage.
This provocative show included a variety of media from painting to copper, fabric to mosaic, mixed media to video. According to the curator, Asia Freeman, “these works confront and challenge, honor and anger, provoke and inspire questions for each of us.”
Two of the pieces were accepted into the bi-annual craft exhibition “Earth, Fire and Fibre” at the Anchorage Museum.
The council would like to thank all of the artists involved for their participation, and for their courage and artistic endeavors.
Photos from Spill
“Reliquae” by Sheila Wyne of Anchorage is cast glass fired twice to create the final shape of the feathers. The combination of clear and opaque black glass creates the effect of beads of crude oil on water or glacier ice.
“Closing the Book” by Kathy Smith of Homer is a bound book made of mixed media including black tar and feathers.
The video “Eleanor” by Tim Geers, from Boston, (screen shot) is named after a Native Alaskan woman interviewed by the artist after the Exxon Valdez spill. The piece depicts grasshoppers trapped and struggling in black crude.