In 2001, Waterfall Arts exhibited ten environmental art installations at their site in Montville, amongst the first in the state to do so. Over the years Waterfall Arts has continued its commitment to “creating community in harmony with nature through the transformative power of the arts,” hosting numerous artists to make temporary or long-lasting interventions at their Montville campus.
This year they will bring the work of six Maine artists to their Belfast location, engaging the audience in a dialogue about environmental sustainability. Portals will include Joline Blais, Deborah Wing-Sproul, Alan Crichton, Krisanne Baker, Nancy Manter, and Barbara Andrus.
Sam Bower, the founder of greenmuseum.org, the premier website during the 2000’s on environmental art and practitioners, recently said that environmental art “can be a portal for people to alter their relationship with nature.”
The upcoming Portals exhibition shows six very different entry points – growing plants, feeding others, natural wood sculpture and structures, water projected, and water drawn on roofing paper.
- Deborah Wing-Sproul will display photographs and artifacts from a deliberate, simple meal offered to one individual at a time.
- Joline Blais will engage the community in a “coded” healing herb garden, each plant designed to heal a specific person.
- Alan Crichton will create a sculpture for the exterior wall of discarded tree root balls.
- Barbara Andrus will create an interior space with her signature construction of sticks and string.
- Nancy Manter will exhibit large drawings of water on roofing paper.
- Krisanne Baker will project rising water on the building and in an interior space.
Portals Exhibition Artist Panel in September will draw out the dialogue between viewer and installation, between different works here, and between the artists.