Wendy Wischer: Parallel Journeys

Parallel Journeys Parallel Journeys

Sponsored by Gene and Lee Seidler, Alice and Dean Fjelstul, The Beaches of Fort Myers

and Sanibel, and the State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs and the Florida Council on Arts and Culture.

Front and back cover images: Video and Monitor Stills from Parallel Journeys, Wendy Wischer, 2018

Wendy Wischer PARALLEL JOURNEYS February 1 - March 1, 2018 Crossroads of Art and Science Wasmer Art Gallery Florida Gulf Coast University Art Galleries

WENDY WISCHER:

PARALLEL JOURNEYS

Image by James J. Greco / Florida Gulf Coast University

INTRODUCTION

John Loscuito, Gallery Director

Florida Gulf Coast University Art Galleries The FGCU Art Galleries is proud to continue working across the curriculum to facilitate student, faculty and public engagement through the arts. For the past four years, artists have been invited to FGCU to explore connections between the Arts and Sciences while working with FGCU faculty and students. Wendy Wischer: Parallel Journeys is the fourth year of the Crossroads: Art and Science residency and exhibition. Wendy Wischer has been collaborating with environmental scientists and activists throughout her career and we were honored that she took time away from teaching at the University of Utah to dedicate herself to the residency.

The essays in this catalogue offer some insight into the residency and her work.

During the residency, Wendy Wischer engaged hundreds of FGCU students and community members with public lectures, class visits, and nature walks. Through these connections, Wischer was introduced to the landscape of Southwest Florida and FGCU’s campus and, in turn, she provided insights into restorative art practices. Win Everham, FGCU Professor of Environmental Studies, worked closely with Wischer involving his students from Conservation Strategies for a Sustainable Future throughout the 2017 Fall semester. During their time together, the students identified four Sacred Spaces on campus for the permanent installation of Wischer’s sculptures.

The results of these collaborations were both tangible and immediate as well as intangible and enduring. A student-focused exhibition entitled Stop and Listen: Environmental Awareness and Restoration came out of these conversations and featured creative writing, theatre, science, art and graphic design students. The feedback received during the exhibition opening reinforced the fact that Wischer’s artwork and teaching illuminate our responsibility to the environment and each other.

Her work can be seen at www.wendywischer.com

Image by James J. Greco / Florida Gulf Coast University

WENDY WISCHER

Resident Artist | 2018 Crossroads of Art and Science Parallel Journeys is a psychological exploration of the conscious and unconscious mind; above and below the surface. At the same time, it dives in and out of emotional experience such as joy, sorrow, loss, fear, hope and peace.

Layered in concept, the viewer is pulled under again and again in shifting timelines as memory blends with sensual perceptions. Water, specifically the ocean, is portrayed as a source for our struggles and pleasures, reflecting ourselves and our projections back at us in hopes that we might gain new insight and new understanding.

Similar to the small percentage of our conscious minds, only 5% of the oceans have been explored and the rest remains unknown. Unlocking the secrets to what currently is out of focus, will prove essential to thriving in the future.

This 6 channel video installation includes a surround sound experience. There is a large screen suspended near the center of the gallery at 9’ x 16’ and 5 monitors in various sizes mounted to one wall and arranged in a collage format from the floor to the ceiling. The monitor videos function as companion videos to the larger one and they reference a sense of place near the ocean: above, at, and below its surface. These videos represent a landscape while also addressing time and direction, both forward and backward, left and right, shedding light on the constructed experience of the medium.

The main video is accompanied by surround sound that fills and circles the room with the intention of submerging the viewer within audio waves. It is comprised of deconstructions of multiple scores created by Kevin McLeod, nature sounds, voice effects by Sarah Shippobotham and fragments of whispered poems written by Sylvia Plath.

The video alternates from the surface of the ocean, to diving into the depths underneath which at times, are represented by fantastical or other worldly settings. The intent is to metaphorically link our conscious and unconscious experience with the known and unknown vastness of the oceans.

Pulling from emotional memory and meditating on notions of both finite and infinite experiences, this piece is intended to invoke contemplation on the known and unknown parts of the self. In one whispered fragment we hear: “Is it the sea you hear in me, Its dissatisfactions? Or the voice of nothing, that was your madness?” In another: “I am terrified by this dark thing that sleeps in me”. 1 I am beginning to grasp that we will have to explore within, deep in our unconscious, to understand our ‘human’ nature in order to be able to solve the challenges we face. Understanding what drives us deep inside, not just on the surface, is where we will find the greatest healing.

It is not an easy path and there will be things we won’t want to see, or take responsibility for, but understanding what compels us to compete with greed, act in ways that ultimately hurt ourselves, and live by systems that destroy the same environments that sustain us, will be one of the first steps to correcting those flaws.

According to “Earth Science Literacy: The Big Ideas and Supporting Concepts of Earth Science,“ big Idea number 5 is that Earth is the water planet and water is essential for life on it. 2 Water is found everywhere on Earth and has existed for billions of years as solid, liquid and gas.

This fundamental substance is critical to all the dynamics of Earth’s systems. The oceans cover over 70 percent of the surface of our planet and about 97 percent of Earth’s water can be found in the oceans. 3 These bodies of water hold the keys to our own survival. We must learn to fully understand the significance of water as the giver of, and connection between, all life.

My intention is to translate data into personal meaning and work with scientific and community collaborators to create impactful projects that will reach far beyond the scope of the art world and out into the community at large. I am interested in bridging the gaps between disciplines in search of greater understanding and impact while creating artwork that moves the viewer in poetic ways. It is when we are moved, that we are compelled to act.

Image by James J. Greco / Florida Gulf Coast University

1 Plath, Sylvia, The Collected Poems, (New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 2008) “Elm” pg.192.

2 Wysession, M. E., D. A. Budd, K. Campbell, M. Conklin, E. Kappel, J. Karsten, N. LaDue, G. Lewis, L. Patino, R. Raynolds, R. W. Ridky, R. M. Ross, J. Taber, B. Tewksbury, and P. Tuddenham, Developing and Applying a Set of Earth Science Literacy Principles, Journal of Geoscience Education, Vol. 60, No. 2, 95-99, 2012.

3 NOAA. National Ocean Service website, https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/podcast/july17/ nop08-historical-maps-charts.html, accessed on 2/9/19.

ARTIST STATEMENT Wendy Wischer

Having lived in both rural and city settings has brought the natural and urban worlds together in my work. The natural world stirs a nostalgic affection and strong sense of identity; at the same time, the excitement of an urban environment and advancing technology prove to be equally intoxicating. With a minimalist approach to form and a conceptual approach to process, I am lured to re-define the shape of my environment: to explore our shifting relationships with nature, the voice of the elements, the topography of technology and the mapping of time, space and memory.

I am interested in boundaries, where they collide, where they overlap, and where they continuously link forming threads throughout, both conceptually and visually with a specific focus on the gap between the visible and the invisible. I address boundaries of nature, technology, science, mythology, personal identity and universal connections. I am fascinated by the sometimes conflicting and magical realms between the physical and the imaginary, the sensual and virtual existence.

With our increasing global climate crisis, I am compelled to incorporate and focus on environmental issues; finding ways to translate data into personal understanding and create artwork that moves the viewer in poetic ways. Often focusing on installations, my interest in light lies in the fluidity of the medium, being both tangible and intangible. The performative nature of light encourages the presence of the viewer to change their movement and reflection, making evident the existence of its occupation in space.

I seek to re-direct attention to the smaller things in life, exposing the sacred within the mundane, and the monumental within the minute. I hope to unveil inherent connections to our surroundings and with that unveiling, to re-establish intrinsic relationships as thoughts and memories, experiences and environments, continuously appear and reappear in overlapping fragments.

Wendy Wischer Select Video Stills

Video Still from Parallel Journeys, Wendy Wischer, 2018

Video Still from Parallel Journeys, Wendy Wischer, 2018

Video Still from Parallel Journeys, Wendy Wischer, 2018

Video Still from Parallel Journeys, Wendy Wischer, 2018

Video Still from Parallel Journeys, Wendy Wischer, 2018

Video Still from Parallel Journeys, Wendy Wischer, 2018

The following poem was written by William Stafford (1914 - 1993), an American poet and pacifist.

His writing has often served as inspiration for Professor Win Everham. In particular, his poem, “Time for Serenity, Anyone?” resonated with all involved in the Templa project.

Time for Serenity, Anyone?

William Stafford

I like to live in the sound of water, in the feel of mountain air. A sharp reminder hits me: this world still is alive; it stretches out there shivering toward its own creation, and I’m part of it. Even my breathing enters in the elaborate give-and-take, this bowing to sun and moon, day or night, winter, summer, storm, still - this tranquil chaos that seems to be going somewhere.

This wilderness with great peacefulness in it.

This motionless turmoil, this everything dance.

Student Collaborative Project SACRED SPACES Sacred Spaces was part of the 2017/2018 Crossroads of Art and Science Artist in Residency.

Utah-based artist Wendy Wischer collaborated with Win Everham, FGCU Professor of Marine and Ecological Sciences, and FGCU students from Conservation Strategies for a Sustainable Future to identify four Sacred Spaces for placement of Wischer’s sculptures entitled Templa.

The locations for Wischer’s permanent site-specific sculptures were chosen to encourage the discovery of these less traveled spaces across our campus.

SACRED SPACES

Win Everham Professor of Marine and Ecological Sciences College of Arts and Sciences Florida Gulf Coast University

As an environmental scientist, I feel my calling is to raise awareness about the challenges we face, and to seek solutions.

My hope is to help move us toward a more sustainable future.

But it is hard to speak truth about the world and not lead people into despair. It is hard to not slide there myself. The first truth I learned in this collaboration was to accept the grief that comes with change and loss. People, trees, entire species, and whole ecosystems die. This has always been true. We must honor the feelings that come with these losses, if we are to move beyond these changes to something new and hopefully joyful.

I believe we must have hope. I seek to empower my students, and myself, to be positive agents of change.

As a scientist, I have had a narrow perspective on finding insight and truth. My path toward truth has involved data and statistics. I collect data and analyze it in ways to separate signal from noise. Patterns emerge and I catch glimpses of truth. I am coming to realize the different, and often more powerful insights and truth, that emerge from art. The second thing I experienced in this collaboration was a confirmation that artists can reveal patterns that I miss and truth that eludes me. My research might illuminate what is happening, but it does little to help me understand how to feel about that truth.

More importantly, though data may speak to some, art speaks more universally. Artists will play a critical role in creating a sustainable world.

As a member of the FGCU community, this collaboration has reminded me of how lucky I am to be teaching here! Our conservation lands, created and restored ecosystems, provide an incredible living laboratory for what I teach in ecology and environmental studies. I can walk out of any building on campus and be right back into a classroom. The 50% of our campus that is green space provides important ecological functions, such as flood control and habitat for the plants and animals that share this landscape. This ‘half earth’ approach to development demonstrates a different way to put our species on the land. I come to work walking down a boardwalk, surrounded by trees, hearing birds or frogs, seeing fish in the wetlands, maybe catching a glimpse of an otter, corn snake, zebra longwing butterfly, deer, osprey, or even an eagle. What a cogent, peaceful, way to begin or end my day! I am very proud to play a part in this collaboration that brings compelling art to help people find kinship with our campus.

Humans evolved with a closer relationship to the life with which we share this planet. Something it seems that we have forgotten. As we lose our connection to this other life, perhaps we lose track of who we are and who we can be. Our campus is a sacred place that helps us remember, and maybe, guides us toward a better future.

Above: Aerial view of Florida Gulf Coast University campus and preservation lands,. Courtesy of FGCU Marketing.

Left: Dr. Win Everham standing in the cypress dome located on FGCU’s Main Campus. Photograph by Wendy Wischer

Wendy Wischer, Templa, 2018, Concrete and mirror, Photograph by Wendy Wischer, FGCU Art Galleries Collection

SACRED SPACES TEMPLA Templa consists of four cast, concrete tree stumps, covered with mirror tiles, that mark each of the four different Sacred Spaces on the FGCU campus.

The colors of the nearby surroundings, as well as the viewers who stop and sit, can be seen in the reflection creating an ever-changing view of the work since the reflections themselves are ever-changing and fluid. These pieces mark a special place for contemplation where one can sit and ponder the environment, both within themselves and that which surrounds them. ~ Wendy Wischer

The following pages were contributed by Win Everham, Professor of Marine and Ecological Sciences, to highlight the unique properties of the campus sites chosen for Wendy Wischer’s “Templa” sculptures. Photographs contributed by Elizabeth D’Anjou, Alyssa Leyva, Ryan Reynold, and Jennifer Roge.

SACRED SPACE #1 MULBERRY HILL GPS 26O 27’ 39.1”, 81O 46’ 25.2”

At this site, you can see the interface between human shaped landscapes with fill material, berms, stormwater treatment areas, selected plantings, and pavement. To the south, north, and west are more ‘natural’ areas, but here also are human legacies: invading species, management efforts to control these invasive exotics, and mechanical treatments to simulate fire, which is a historically important factor that shapes the plant communities. The plants and animals of these habitats are adapted to a pattern of water and fire. When humans change either, or both, the biotic communities change. The campus design attempts to fit students, staff, and faculty into campus, while still preserving native diversity and Sacred Space #1 providing integrated green spaces.

Spend time at this site and you are sure to see a diversity of birds who use the variety of habitats in this area of campus. During migration, huge tornado-like funnels of tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) will sweep the edges of the forest. With time, you may be lucky enough to see a southern black racer (Coluber constrictor priapus) or red corn snake (Pantherophis guttatus) passing through, or a red shouldered hawk (Buteo lineatus), looking for a snake.

SACRED SPACE #2 OAK HAMMOCK GPS 26O 27’ 50.4”, 81O 46’ 1.6”

As you enter an oak hammock, you can feel the cooling effect of the denser hardwood canopy that shades out more of the sun. ‘Hammock” is a term used in ecology to denote a stand, or island, of trees usually higher than associated wetlands, and sometimes next to even higher, drier, often more open conifer forests. To get to this site, you walk through a narrow band of surviving pine forest, and if you continue east, the hammock becomes a cypress swamp. This site has an interesting history of human use.

The Calusa probably traveled up the Estero River and used these oak hammocks to camp, hunt, and collect plant material. (This site showed evidence of use, pottery shards, in the Phase I Cultural Survey of the campus site). As humans of European descent moved onto this landscape, they too were attracted to these Sacred Space #2 cooler hammocks for hunting and camping.

When the campus construction started, an old ‘bump bucket’ could be found a bit to the north, and in several spaces throughout the hammock you can find wild citrus trees, legacies of some hunter’s lunch. Today, students find this site a cool, peaceful place to study or just relax into the peace of green places.

If you wait quietly here for long enough, you might see a raccoon (Procyon lotor) hunting for cabbage palm (Sabal palmetto) seeds, or a white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) or wild pig (Sus scrofa) looking for acorns. Listen closely for the hoot of a barred owl (Strix varia).

SACRED SPACE #3 PINE BERM GPS 26O 28’ 4.7”, 81O 46’ 5.5”

This site is visible from the boardwalk, for those who bother to look. To the west is a native marsh, and to the south and east is another wetland, a cypress swamp. This habitat is a transitional forest of slash pine (Pinus elliotii) and sabal palms (Sabal palmetto) also called cabbage palm. Slash pine may have gotten its name from the practice of cutting or slashing the bark to bleed sap used to produce turpentine and rosin. It has also been an important timber species; probably all of the campus has been logged in the past. Sabal palms are the Florida state tree as of 1953. The ‘cabbage’ name comes from the edible heart of palm, used by Native Americans and Florida crackers. This tree is well adapted to hurricane winds, losing fronds but seldom snapping off or uprooting.

This adaptation makes it easy to transplant and now the sabal palm is often used as landscape Sacred Space #3 plant along roads or in developments.

If you are here at dusk during the rainy season, you may hear as many as ten species of frogs from the marsh to the south, one of our longterm frog monitoring sites on campus. Listen for the Florida cricket frog (Acris gryllus dorsalis) which sound like marbles clicking against one another, the grunt of a pig frog (Rana grylio), the sheep-like ‘bah’ of a eastern narrowmouth toad (Gastrophryne carolinensis carolinensis), the squeaky-shoe quack of a squirrel treefrog (Hyla squirella), the chick-like peeping of the oak toad (Anaxyrus quercicus), or maybe, if you are lucky, the hound-like bay of the barking tree frog (Hyla gratiosa).

SACRED SPACE #4 TRAIL FORK GPS 26O 28’ 3.2”, 81O 45’ 50.0”

This site, on the edge of a human-created berm, illustrates the impact we have on the landscape.

Historically, fire and water shaped the plant communities on our landscape, which in turn influenced the distribution of animals. Clearly, today the most potent force in shaping the distribution of plants and animals is humans. We dig ditches and construct berms to alter the flow of water across the land, and dig wells and ponds that alter the flows between surface and ground water. We both extirpate some species and introduce, accidentally or intentionally, others.

And, we change patterns of fire. Humans are the most powerful agent of change on the planet, but change has always been part of ecosystems.

Restoration ecology captures human efforts to reverse changes that have negatively impacted native biodiversity and ecosystem services.

Reconciliation ecology is an evolving effort to Sacred Space #4 develop ways to fit humans into the landscape while also providing habitat for native species.

Ecosystems will continue to change and as humans, we continue to be a primary force driving many of those changes. However, we have the ability to learn and become agents of positive change.

Here you might see a white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) feeding in the open marsh areas, or a wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) running along the berm. A variety of butterflies pollinate the native wildflowers growing along the berm; perhaps you will see the state butterfly, the zebra longwing (Heliconius charithonia). Florida Panthers (Puma concolor coryi) have been observed traveling along Stuart Slough to the east.

Student Collaborative Project STOP AND LISTEN ArtLab Gallery | Library Building West Stop and Listen was initiated as part of the Crossroads of Art and Science Residency 2017 with artist Wendy Wischer and Win Everham, Professor of Environmental Studies. The multi-month, interactive exhibition invited FGCU students and community members to voice their concerns, interests and research surrounding environmental issues.

The unique exhibition embraced the gallery space as a working space, an “Art Lab,� allowing for the participants to build upon their ideas over the two month time period, sharing both initial sketches and finished works.

On Thursday, November 16th, a closing event revealed the culmination of work from participating students across campus including artists, actors, scientists, designers, and environmental sustainability students.

The reception began with performances from the Environmental Theatre class.

Faculty and students from Ceramics I, Wheel Throwing, Social Engagement Art and Ecology, Graphic Design I, Colloquium, and Conservation Strategies for a Sustainable Future then presented an overview of their contributions to the exhibition.

Environmental Theatre students performing a Banraku style of puppetry during the November 16, 2017 reception.

Photo courtesy of Caitlin Rosolen - De Jesus

Editors: John Loscuito, Anica Sturdivant Graphic Designer: Anica Sturdivant Contributing Authors: Win Everham, John Loscuito, and Wendy Wischer Students of Conservation Strategies for a Sustainable Future: Elizabeth D’Anjou, Alyssa Leyva, Ryan Reynold, and Jennifer Roge Photographic Contributions: Win Everham, James Greco, Wendy Wischer, and Caitlin Rosolen - De Jesus Bower School of Music & the Arts Staff: John Loscuito, Gallery Director Anica Sturdivant, Assistant Curator / Gallery Coordinator Andy Morris, Teaching Laboratory Supervisor Joanna Hoch, Events Coordinator Mary Cooper, Executive Secretary Gallery Assistants: Hannah Bautz, Amber Frank, Kaitlyn Handley, Chloe Isabella Lewis, Sean Shinham, Caitlin Rosolen - De Jesus

William Stafford, “Time for Serenity, Anyone?,” from Even in Quiet Places. Copyright © 1996 by The Estate of William Stafford. Reprinted with the permission of The Permissions Company, Inc., on behalf of Confluence Press, www.confluencepress.com.

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