A curator’s-eye view of “Grounded,” a video and photography exhibit opening this month, the result of a collaboration between Ellen Curlee Gallery and St. Louis Earth Day. Though the show engages with ecology, it’s far afield of the soapbox or precious nature photography
By Dana Turkovic
Photograph “US Route 24, Gilman, IL #1” (2005) by Chase Browder
The idea and theme of “Grounded: Photography and Our Contemporary Environment,” opening this month at Ellen Curlee Gallery, developed through an ongoing discussion between the gallery and St. Louis Earth Day. Fortunately, as I set out to curate the show, I found a cadre of national and international emerging artists, including Chase Browder, Chris Jordan, Maslen and Mehra, and Brian Ulrich, who feel art can provide insights into the ecological challenges facing us.
“Grounded” brings together photography and video art that focuses on the fundamental relationship between humans and nature. During the environmental art movement of the late 1960s and ’70s, artists aimed to weaken the boundaries between high art and everyday experience through public installations and performances. Joseph Beuys and Richard Long were some of the first to try to generate environmental awareness through their work. I had these seminal artists in mind when researching the exhibition. I looked to new photographers who show the complex and dynamic interrelationship between humans and the earth, such as Chris Jordan, who photographs mounds of discarded objects and materials such as cellphones, used tires, keyboards and cigarette butts. His abstract view looks to find beauty in our trash, but more importantly, he points to the connections between art and science, social interaction and environmental duty. Through his monumental photograph, Intolerable Beauty, he challenges us to observe our world, and our relationship to the world, through a landscape of the artificial sublime. Also included is Chicago-based artist Brian Ulrich, who approaches the subject of consumption in a similar but more documentary way. Using a waist-level viewfinder, his three-chapter candid series Copia features powerful images of retail sites, capturing peculiar shopping moments and highlighting our interaction with material goods. The work serves not only an anthropological function, but also a historical one, as he attempts to transform the way we view our habits of excess and over-consumption.
As part of St. Louis Earth Day’s team, the concept of my exhibition is rooted in the organization’s year-round mission to bring sustainable practices to St. Louis by forming strategic alliances and providing credible environmental information to the community. St. Louis Earth Day also produces an annual festival (scheduled for April 20 of this year) to carry out its mission; as curator, my role was to view humanity through the lens of ecology and to bring together work that plays on our interconnectedness with nature.
The works on display in this exhibiton come from a new generation of environmental artists with a vision of anxiety, revolution and hope. By one definition, all artists (and now even curators) seek to change the world; the act of making things, or even offering original ideas, is inherently a hopeful pursuit, embracing no less than a frail wish that their observations will bring about some level of transformation. My hope is that “Grounded” proposes art as a way of creating a better understanding about our relationship with nature and the environment and exploring the renewed role of contemporary art as a leading force. I hope, too, that it will test how our notions of art and artists are relevant to a global debate about the future of the planet.
"Grounded: Photography and Our Contemporary Environment" opens at Ellen Curlee Gallery (1308-A Washington, 314-241-1299, ellencurleegallery.com) on March 15 and runs through May 10.
