Artist in Residence: Serena JV Elston
March 3-26, 2020
Serena will turn Dream Farm Commons into a research and making laboratory, working with oak gall ink, casting, and writing as mediums to critique human’s relationship with nature. This amazing emerging artist investigates how mythology and folklore have built and reinforced a framework of extractive, domination focused ecological policies. Through an ecocritical lens Serena will present a sculptural reality of the cornucopia myth and the story The Woodcutter and the Trees; Exploring the agricultural mirage these stories teach and how their influence continues notions of unending abundance."
stay tuned for artist's talk later in the month....
FRUITFUL BODIES
Fruitful Bodies is a sculptural work that explores the narrative function of sexual violence towards female representations of nature in mythologies. It is made entirely from a single species of mushroom grown in the form of a female body crawling towards an open window.
Stories of nymphs and dryads found in Greek Mythology have a recurring plot in which a male character sexually assaults the nymph. The only defense these female characters are given is to relinquish their divinity and metamorphize into a natural formation, like a stream or a species of tree, to avoid predation. Specifically, these changed feminine bodies become resources for human consumption. These myths serve as justification for taming and extractive practices towards nature and commodification of women’s bodies.
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