Public Arts

LandEscapes: Mount Desert Hosts Annual Interdisciplinary
Public Art Event

	Sam Van Aken’s bronze Killer Tomatoes. Photo by Sam Van Aken.

The Mount Desert Symposium in the Arts, LandEscapes, is an annual interdisciplinary program in its sixth year. This symposium brings together the arts and the sciences to explore and connect themes related to community and global issues. Each year a limited number of scholars, artists and activists are invited to reside on the island with volunteer hosts. They have the opportunity to experience the beauty and history of Mount Desert Island and present their work to diverse year-round and summer communities. In return, they share their skills and expertise in the form of workshops, dialogues, installations and panel discussions in various venues and locations that change from year to year. All artists designed public work installed out of doors on the College of the Atlantic farm and this year’s LandEscapes 2006 ARTFare was centered on the theme of food.

Fifteen curators were invited to select artists for site specific installations at Beech Hill Farm, College of the Atlantic, July 23 through August 12, 2006, as part of an annual event LandEscapes, organized by artist/curator and Maine native Nancy Manter. A sample of the pairings includes Mark Bessire, director of Bates College Museum of Art in Lewiston, ME, who selected artists Christina Bechstein, Adriane Herman and Aaron Stephan; professors from the Maine College of Art in Portland. Bechstein’s piece was placed in the apple orchard and researched the history of apple growing in Maine. Working with a writer/apple specialist, John Bunker, she illustrated her investigation by labeling the trees with strips of cloth that had the names of apple varieties printed on them and tied like prayer flags on the limbs. Some of the pieces of cloth had quotes about the perils of single species monocrop growth. Others highlighted the history of apple growing as well as the poetics of everyone’s orchard containing the possibility of a personalized uniqueness. Herman molded birdseed into the shapes of old suitcases. These were placed around the farm — some appearing to be half-buried, and all to be eaten away by the birds.

	Mimi Moncier and helper wrapping apple.

Bruce Brown, former curator from Center for Maine Contemporary Art in Rockport, ME, selected Sam Van Aken, Professor of sculpture at the University of Maine in Orono. Sam created a bronzed Killer Tomato plant that fetchingly captured the light as the tomatoes barred their hybridized teeth. Susan Dowling, Art 21 producer, of Manset and Pawtucket, RI, chose artist Mimi Moncier from New Orleans who created fabric out of fast food trash and wrapped a fallen apple tree. Helen Ferrulli, independent curator and curator for Scholastic Arts Awards program asked Monica Chau of Camden, ME, whose piece signaled the potential extinction of fish species through the creation of a fish cemetery.

Katy Kline, director of Bowdoin College Museum of Art, selected the collaborative team of Dan Spitzer and Jill Reynolds from Beacon, NY. Dan made a piece entitled Gollum which is a Yiddish name for a creature made of mud. He made clay and cookie ovals imprinted with Hebrew letters, the first, last and middle of the alphabet, representing the importance of language to civilization. The word ‘truth’ appeared on the other side of the ovals, originally written on a piece of paper and slipped into Gollum’s mouth or ear to bring him to life. The cookies both real and clay, were offered to all visitors. Jill did an installation piece, a kind of secret garden behind the apple orchard, constructed entirely from materials on site.

Carl Little, author and art critic from Mount Desert Island, chose Alison Enslin of Milbridge, Maine, as his artist. Barbara Andrus of Swans Island and NYC, was the choice of Susan Lerner, director of the Blum gallery at the College of the Atlantic. Hillarie Logan-Dechene of the Iron Bridge Gallery in Long Lake, NY, selected Matt Burnett of Saranac Lake, NY, a graduate of the Maine College of Art. Nancy Manter, artist and director of LandEscapes from NYC and Tremont, Maine selected Margaret Manter, artist from Veazie. Wally Mason, director of the University of Maine Art Museum in Bangor asked Lauren Fensterstock, artist and professor at the Maine College of Art. Patricia Phillips, critic and professor of art at the State University of New York at New Paltz, selected Deborah Wing-Sproul, from Portland, ME, a performance-based videographer, sculptor and printmaker.

	Christina Bechstein and apple specialist, John Bunker.

Sam Shaw of Shaw Jewelry in Northeast Harbor, ME, selected Avy Clair, artist from Blue Hill, ME and NYC, who constructed a corn field whose “stalks” were topped with cans of corn. Deborah Whitney, director of Whitney Art Works in Portland, ME, selected artist Jeff Badger of South Portland who made enormous cupcakes complete with sprinkles that served as targets for arrows, and finally Sydney Roberts Rockefeller, curator from Great Harbor Maritime Museum selected the Neighborhood House kids, both from Northeast Harbor. Couched throughout the insightful and often humorous exhibition were references to agribusiness and the removal of society from the sources of its nourishment.

The installations were accompanied by a week of workshops also thematically centered, ranging from poetry readings, ceramic classes on the history of the dinner plate and cookbook authors who demonstrated their talents serving as preface for a lively African drum ensemble closing party.

This is a spectacular annual event and next year is full of promise.

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	Adrienne Herman’s Birdseed Suitcases.