Digging through this area of newly off-loaded trash, I discovered more food items...unopened, new, etc. I continue to be quite surprised at how often I see this kind of thing...perfectly good food ending up at the city dump. I photographed just "some" of it this time.
Metro News (metro, being Portland's local government), has published a couple more "artist reviews," highlighting those of us who are working in this year's glean program.
Meet the GLEAN Artists:
Andrew Auble
What do you get when you send five artists dressed in safety gear into a room for six months to sift through a steady stream of trash? The answer will be revealed at GLEAN, an environmental art exhibit at Disjecta Contemporary Art Center of Portland. The goal of the show, slated to run from Sept. 14 through 30, is to prompt people to think about how to create more and waste less.
GLEAN artist Andrew Auble has held residencies at the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts and the Vermont Studio Center. A frequent exhibitor on the local and national scene, Auble’s work critiques mainstream and marginal issues, from income inequality and corporate greed to music and sexuality.
At Metro Central Transfer Station, his eye catches on dog food labels, cigarette foil, Japanese magazines, stickers and shiny gift bags to use in his work. Aubel enjoys mixing modern and archaic forms, calling some product labels "majestic." He reports having collected "a sizable swath of materials that I’m excited about."
The discards are more than rubbish to Auble. He’s uncovering the workings of society and drawing conclusions to help us understand it more thoroughly.
GLEAN is a public, private, nonprofit partnership between Metro, the regional government that guides the region’s garbage and recycling system; Recology, an employee-owned company that manages resource recovery facilities; and Cracked Pots, an environmental arts group that manages the program. Now in its second year, GLEAN takes its inspiration from Recology San Francisco’s renowned artist in residence program.
The artists, selected by a jury of arts and environmental professionals, include Andrew Auble, Chandra Glaeseman, Greg Hanson, Jennifer LaMastra and Sarah Wolf Newlands. Reflecting the diversity of talent in the Portland region’s creative class, the group consists of instructors at area art schools, graduates of well-known universities and an art therapist. They are award winning professionals whose works have been in solo and group shows – locally and nationally.
Their work ranges from sculpture to mixed media assemblage to wearable art. They use modern and archaic forms, altering the commonplace into non-traditional and sometimes formal compositions.
The process of creating pieces and the transformation going on in the artists and their studios is compelling stuff. The artists have a blog and frequently muse about their adventures and experiences.
Meet the GLEAN Artists:
Chandra Glaeseman
Chandra Glaeseman is a sculptor whose work examines the marks civilization makes. She holds degrees from the Rhode Island School of Design and Maine College of Art. Since 2007, Glaeseman has been interested in what she refers to as "the garbage factor," viewing waste as "a holistic portraiture of who we are as a society." She is an assistant professor at the Pacific Northwest College of Art.
Glaeseman sees the act of throwing garbage away as an attempt to delete or remove a part of history from existence.
Describing her role in the GLEAN project, Glaeseman says, "In a sense I feel like we are taking other’s lemons and making a fabulous lemon soufflé."
I got to visit Andrew's studio in June. More photos and information about him here in my blog.
I also got to visit Chandra's studio...a few photos:
I also got to visit Chandra's studio...a few photos:
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