The 2015 Great ARTdoors Festival

Despite a rainy, cloudy day on October 10, 2015, hundreds of people came to enjoy the art, artists, and autumn scenery while helping to support the Center’s residency program and nature preserve.

Fun was had by all with hayride tours of the artist-in-residence studios, art installations and demonstrations, plenty of live music, and fresh local food & beverages, featuring an old-fashioned pig roast. There was also an invitational show & sale of pottery and hand-made wares, U-Do-Raku (glaze your own pottery to keep), artist talks, native plant sale and activities for children of all ages.

Festival Highlights

Open Studio Tour & Talks with our distinguished artists-in-residence from Georgia, Tennessee, Ohio, Kentucky, Myanmar, Venezuela, and Virginia

Art Installations presented Molly Rose Freeman, Pandra Williams, and collaborators Rae Long & Martha Whittington, plus a special community art installation, Rise Together Rabun, by Charlie Brouwer!

Puppetry Performance by Julia Hill

Poetry Readings by Julie Hensley

Invitational Pottery & Handmade Objects Exhibition featuring Hambidge Fellows and artists from across the region

U-Do-Raku – choose a pot, glaze it yourself and have it fired to take home

Live Music including the sultry Southern soul of Leah Song, traditional mountain bluegrass by Oliver Rice and the Blue Ridge Mountain Boys, and Americana fun with Rust

An Old-fashioned Pig Roast serving up our own Bar-B-Q alongside smoked Springer Mountain Farms Chicken, local tasty provisions, local wines and brews

Arts & Crafts Demonstrations with spinning by Rita Rothmeier and pottery by the Hambidge Antinori Potters

Native Plant Sale and Kid's Activities by Beech Hollow Wildflower Farm

Something About Mary... Did you know Mary Hambidge? Bring a story about Mary to the Rock House and tell it to Hal Jcobs for his new documentary about her - and watch out takes from the video so far.

Snake Handling and reptile & amphibian education by the Orianne Society

Activities for All Ages, with grits grinding, pumpkin painting, a bouncy house, face painting by Macon Faces, and art-making for everyone!

Artists

Charlie Brouwer
Catherine Clements
Molly Rose Freeman
Julie Hensley
Julia Hill
Macey Ley
Rae Long and Martha Whittington
Isabela Muci
Soe Yu Nwe
Oliver Rice & the Blue Ridge Mountain Boys
Rust
Leah Song of Rising Appalachia
Pandra Williams and Susan Cipcic

Project & Artist Descriptions

Charlie Brouwer
In Rise Together Rabun, Charlie Brouwer has invited the whole community to become engaged in the process by loaning the ladders needed to create an installation about the community in the form of a large temporary arch sculpture at Hambidge’s entrance.

Catherine Clements
In her recent work Catherine Clements has been creating compositions by overlapping printed images that reference her environment. When printing she mixes ink in a range of transparencies to allow for a visual relationship between images. While in residence she plans to expand on these components by exploring how they interact in the third dimension with the use bookbinding techniques.

Catherine received my Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, focused in Printmaking, from Bowling Green State University in 2013. During this time she served as the President of BGSU's Print Society, and assisted many visiting artists. Since then she has participated in residencies, workshops and conferences, both in the US and Canada.

In addition to her artistic pursuits, Catherine actively engages in sustainable living. She is an avid gardener, canner, composter, and recycler. This mentality is reflected in her artistic practice. Scrap paper is turned into pulp, proofs are turned into book covers, and plates are turned into encaustic paintings. By reusing materials not only does she create as little waste as possible, but she challenges herself to conceive of multiple secondary uses for every material she uses.

Molly Rose Freeman
Molly Rose Freeman’s current work is rooted in the body. She uses pattern and geometry to explore the rhythms, forces, and structures that exist within human beings, whether skeletal, neural or emotional. Each piece is a personal meditation on the idea that the forms and dynamics that exist within her body are also expressed in diverse ways throughout the universe.

Her most recent work focuses on the heart, specifically the flow of blood through its chambers. For the installation “Heart Blood” she created a pair of rounded mirrored sculptures to represent the two valves of the heart, CNC-cut with hand-drawn patterns inspired by the network of blood vessels that encapsulates the tissue. Suspended from the ceiling and rotating slowly, the forms are lit with red and blue light which both project and reflect the patterns onto the wall in flowing, colored light. The effect is what she imagines swimming through a blood vessel would feel like. She is interested in using simple elements of color, pattern and movement to create dynamic environments that tap into the pulse of living ecosystems.

Molly Rose Freeman received her high school diploma in Visual Arts from the North Carolina School of the Arts in 2005, and in 2010 earned her BA in Creative Writing from the University of North Carolina at Asheville. She received the Thomas Wolfe Award for Fiction in 2008 and the Wylma Dykeman Award for Creative Non-Fiction in 2010.

After several years working from a studio in Asheville's River Arts District and studying visual patterning in sacred architecture, Molly moved to Atlanta in 2013. She is currently a Resident with The Creatives Project and maintains a studio at the Goat Farm Arts Center. She was recently selected as a 2014-2015 Walthall Fellow through Wonderroot and exhibited in an associated group show at MOCA-GA in July of this year.

Freeman had a solo exhibition at Beep Beep Gallery in 2014 and has been featured in group exhibitions at venues throughout the Southeast, and has painted public murals in collaboration with Living Walls.

Julie Hensley
While in residence at Hamabidge, Julie Hensley will be developing a collection of poems entitled “Breaking Ground.” This cycle intertwines the voices of Grace and Nohl, chronicling a couple from their courtship through the eventual dissolution of their marriage. As the couple builds a cabin together, their relationship violently unravels.

“While the poems are fictional, the conflict driving Breaking Ground draws on my perception of the decade my sister spent in an abusive marriage. (Like so many battered women, she heavily guarded her secret. Not until her ex-husband broke her jaw, an injury not easily explained, did we begin to know the truth.) While eight years have passed since my sister left that relationship, I’m still questioning everything about her journey, still wondering how? How did she come to love this man? How did he come to hurt her? What pain in both their pasts simmered into the roles they came to inhabit?”

Julie Hensley grew up on a sheep farm in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia and traveled west to earn a MFA from Arizona State University. Now she makes her home in Kentucky with her husband (the writer R. Dean Johnson) and their two children. She is a core faculty member of the Bluegrass Writers Studio, the low-residency MFA program at Eastern Kentucky University. Her poems and stories have appeared in dozens of journals, and in 2011, a chapbook of her poems, “The Language of Horses,” was published by Finishing Line Press. In 2015, Michelle Herman selected “Landfall: A Ring of Stories” as the winner of Ohio State University Non/fiction Prize. The cyclical short story collection, which chronicles three generations of families in a small Appalachian town, will be published by OSU Press in 2016.

Hensley’s writing has garnered numerous awards and honors, including Southern Women Writers Emerging Voice Award in both poetry (2009) and fiction (2005). In 2007, her short story collection, Landfall, won the inaugural Everett Southwest Literature Award. More recently, she has received poetry grants from Kentucky Foundation for Women and Kentucky Arts Council. She has been a writing fellow at Hambidge Center for the Arts and Creative Sciences and at Hopscotch House.

Julia Hill
The Wolf is a 10' tall, two-person puppet designed and constructed by Julia Hill. The Wolf combines marionette-like leg movements, an articulating head and mouth, and a fantastic presence. Thick ridges of fur layered with a loose translucent skin give The Wolf an ethereal quality, emphasized by large, golden eyes. Half fairy tale, half ghost. Don't worry, she usually doesn't bite!

Julia Hill was born in New Orleans, LA in 1983. After receiving a strong foundations education at The New Orleans Center for Creative Arts, she studied sculpture and printmaking at Tulane University and received her Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2005.

Julia’s work incorporates many genres, including performance, installation, puppetry, metal fabrication, carpentry, ceramics, drawing and painting. She is represented by Whitespace Gallery in Atlanta, GA. Her large scale puppets have been performed at The High Museum, The World of CocaCola, The Atlanta Zoo, The New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, and numerous regional parades and festivals. In addition to her personal pursuits, Julia greatly enjoys designing and constructing work for larger artistic productions. She has worked collaboratively with many artists, including multiple projects with choreographer Blake Beckham, Out of Hand Theater, and Atlanta Metal Arts.

Macey Ley
Macey Ley’s latest body of work "Versions of Truth" is a series of sculptures made of clear acrylic panels and linen and polyester thread. Utilizing the properties of the materials to create illusions of mass and matter, the work centers on double entendres – how perception can shape and cloud perspective, resulting in a variety truths.

During her stay at Hambidge, Macey intends to assemble the pieces of the large suspended installation titled "longer than knowing even wonders.” Made of pint-sized plastic water bottles collected from all over the country, each disk will be linked together with plastic garment tags, forming flexible, translucent blankets that can be twisted into a variety of forms.

Dealing with illusion, waste and memory, "longer than knowing even wonders" is the history of a collective. It is a mass accumulation of like items that once belonged to individuals transformed into one brilliant voice. Objects of seeming insignificance and disregard hold the memories of fleeting experiences - some just as forgettable as the item, yet others whose stories will last a lifetime. When completed, viewers will be able walk under and around the installation, with each vantage point offering a unique experience. Though individual pieces are transparent, layering them into navigable space will make some areas more opaque and warped - a metaphor both for how the accumulation of time clouds memory and of how objects become a stand-in for them.

maceyley.com

Rae Long and Martha Whittington
I Am Silo is an installation by Martha Whittington and sound improvisation written and performed by Rae Long. Rae and Martha reanimated Silo expressing passions, revealing the beauty and reverberations, harmonics and repetitive nature of the existence of life and aging, regret, reflection, harmony and the life cycle/non-cycle life. The realization sounds in a reflective emotional levitation of Silo telescoping the current world-universe relationship during the weeks of 25.08.2015-06.09.2015.

The collaborative team of Whittington and Rae bring together the tradition of craft in music and visual art. This team presents the human condition of times bygone and the modern era through their environmental sculpture and sound works.

Martha Whittington is a sculptor based in Atlanta Georgia. Whittington received her BFA from Kansas City Art Institute and her MFA from Tyler School of Art. Whittington has exhibited her work both nationally and internationally with shows in Berlin, Hong Kong, Istanbul.

Rae Long is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, musician, songwriter and artist working in Norway. Rae is an isolationist and does not listen to or perform works by any composer artist and has held a life long self study and theory that everyone will generate similar music and sounds based on the musicality of the instruments presented to her.

Isabela Muci
“Addressing abandonment is a recognition of memory. I have a natural disposition to pick up, reconstruct and transform throwaways. Before discarding anything into the garbage, a pause gives way for doubt to step in as to its possible recuperation. In 2004 I recovered from the street wooden drums for electric cable. Since then, I like to visit debris lots, and the excitement I feel when I discover them and take them home is absolute. In my studio, next to other findings of various natures, they will probably have a happier outcome than being buried in a waste lot. Once they find their place, I disassemble them to begin a dialogue between us, to give way for a metamorphosis as I start to work on the drums and wood pieces that conform them. Thus they enter my operating room and I proceed to the rescue: I bind them with paintbrushes and oil paint.”

A Venezuelan painter who very recently relocated to Miami, Isabela Muci studied Fine Arts in Paris at Parsons School of Design after obtaining her degree in Journalism in Caracas' Catholic Andres Bello University. She has shown her work in many solo shows and art fairs, and will have three solo shows in 2015, in Miami, Paris and Caracas.

Soe Yu Nwe
During her residency at the Hambidge Center, Soe Yu Nwe will explore making metaphorical drawings by experimenting with site-specific ephemeral clay installations. From the solitude and total immersion in nature at Hambidge, Soe will meditate on the idea of selfhood in relation to nature, femininity and creativity. She hopes to trace the conceived reflection by delineating liminal bodies intimated with the materials of nature.

Soe Yu Nwe is an international artist from Myanmar. In 2009, she left Myanmar to study abroad in the United States at Albion College. In 2013, she received her BFA from Albion College and was awarded the Outstanding Senior Art Major Award and Who's Who Among Students in American Universities and Colleges upon graduation. She continued her education at Rhode Island School of Design, and recently graduated from their MFA program. Soe Yu has received numerous awards and research grants from Albion College and Michigan Ceramic Art Association such as MCAA Scholarship Awards and Runyon Pottery Award for Outstanding Ceramic Entry.

Oliver Rice and the Blue Ridge Mountain Boys

Rust
Emerging from the Southern Crescent region that links DC to New Orleans, Rust melds the sounds of the blues, southern rock, Americana, and folk music. The band's sound has trickled from the Appalachian mountains and the Mississippi Delta, through the roots of rock and roll, to today's unique combination. Each of the band members brings his unique addition to the musical stew, from 1960's country music to the New Orleans sound to a pinch of old-school punk attitude. Rust plays music that'll get your feet moving, and keep you humming the next day.

Sean Moran, lead vocals and acoustic guitar; Allen Peterson, fiddle, accordion, and backing vocals; Marty Brotzge, bass; Craig Humphrey, guitar, mandolin, and backing vocals; Steve Lingo, drums and backing vocals

Leah Song
Leah Song is a powerful songstress, musician,multi-instrumentalist, storyteller, poet, and global griot steeped in the traditions of Southern Soul and international Roots Music. Living between New Orleans, Cuba India, Appalachia, and Latin America she tears into songs with outrageous prowess- incorporating sultry vocals, rhythm, banjo, guitar, ballads, dance, and storytelling into her work. Both a performer and a teacher, she travels with fire under her belt, songs in her pocket, and a global girth that carries her spirit to every corner it touches. Leah often works as front woman with her sister Chloe Smith of the internationally acclaimed project Rising Appalachia.

Pandra Williams and Susan Cipcic
The Hambidge Mundus, created by Pandra Williams is a living wall of plants that form a cul-de-sac atop an earthwork, serving as an experiential lens which limits the viewer’s gaze, restricting their focus to the native plants, flowers, insects and birds to which would have otherwise gone unnoticed.

During the Great ARTdoors Festival, Pandra and her collaborator Susan Cipcic will conduct Arcana Nomina, a participatory naming ceremony for the plants and the creatures that depend upon the plants.

Pandra Williams’ environmental installation practice focuses viewer attention through the creation of interactions between the viewer and subtle or possibly overlooked details of the natural environment which both serves and sustains us. Multidisciplinary artist Susan A. Cipcic (MFA 1999, GSU) has been a Georgia Master Gardener since 2006. She often incorporates moss and other garden thematics in her installations.

Event Co-Chairs

Chef Tyler Williams of By Hand Pizza
Carla & Carl Fackler of Stonewall Creek Vineyards

Hosts

Platinum Possums Susan & Ron Antinori + Lucinda Bunnen + Debbie Lenz Clark & Steve Clark + Bonnie Beauchamp-Cooke & George Cooke + Marchant & Ron Martin + W. Chester Old & Steven Bennett of Mountain House [modern]

Golden Eagles Alecia Adair-Foltz & Doug Foltz + Lyn & Rick Asbill + Turner Ball + Melissa Bunnen-Jernigan & James Jernigan + Stuart Clayton & Joe Staley + Sherry & Jeff Cohen + Annette Cone-Skelton & Robert Hipps + Margaret & Dallas Denny + Jesica & Brian Eames + Jennifer & Bowman Garrett + Sally & Warren Jobe + Marianne Lambert + Judy & Scott Lampert + Jo & Jim McLean + Donna & Jeff Mintz + Kirk Rich & Todd Higginbotham + Paula & Russ Rogers + Jane Fickling Skinner & Dan Skinner + Mary & Sam Thomas + Ruth West & Bob Wells + Kathy & David Williams

Silver Foxes Barbara Pyle Foundation + Bobbi Cleveland & Stan Jones + Martha Eskew & Chet Tisdale + Carla & Carl Fackler + Elizabeth Feichter & Frank White + Nikki Gugliotta + Laura & Gregg Heard + Wanda Hopkins + Ann & Tim Johnson + Mo Kennedy + Elizabeth & David Martin + Barbara P. Roper + Faulkner & Anthony Sgro + Jane & John Shackleton + Kay & Alex Summers + Jessica & Matthew White + Barb & Thom Williams + Woodie & Steve Wisebram

Bronze Bears Judy & Dick Allison + Jane & Dave Apple + Pam & Jamie Breen + Dirk Brown & Tim Burns + Becky & Tom Callahan + Carolyn & Scott Dingman + Meridith Edwards + Lisa Ezzard & Brooks Franklin + Martha & John Ezzard + Laura & Tony Gaines + Charles Gandy + Carol & Larry Gellerstedt + Eve & Joel Goldstein + Beth Jones + JoAnn & Jim Kiley + Mitchell Klink + Pat & Nolan Leake + Chris Lewis & John Johnson + Mary & Robin Line + Rosemary Magee & Ron Grapevine + Saundra Maass-Robinson + Libby Mathews + Katherine Mitchell & Jack Lawing + Vicky Nixon + Laura Palickar & Wally Curran + Margaret & Kincaid Patterson + Lilly & Jake Reid + Georgia Schley Ritchie & Diff Ritchie + Leckie & Bill Stack + Brenda Stockdale & Michael Milton + Elizabeth & Ian Swan + Susie & Lee Winton