July 31st, 2021 | Story by B. Amore Arts Correspondent | Originally Posted in the Rutland Herald
Whitney Ramage initiated the 77ART Residency program in 2018 with a “pilot program” at the former CVPS building at 77 Grove St. in Rutland. She wanted to create the kind of space in her home state that she had experienced in a residency at Mass MoCA, which had given her dedicated time and space to make her art in a small city setting. The program has since grown in scope, encompassing three residencies in 2019, and two sessions in this miracle year at the tail end of COVID-19.
From the start, there has been incredible support from the Rutland community. Mark Foley Properties has sponsored the physical space for the residencies and housing, first at 77 Grove St., and now in the historic Ripley Opera House on Merchants Row in downtown Rutland. The residency has partnered with The MINT, a state-of -the-art communal workshop and makers-space. This gives the artists who inhabit the beehive of studios at the Opera House access to tools and machinery to expand their work.
A dedicated cadre of volunteers assists with raising many in-kind contributions, including lunches three days a week. This year’s volunteer committee is comprised of Laurie Arner, John Brodowski, Lionel Church, Karla Ganley, Justin Jankus, Beth Miller and Martha Molner. Ramage says that it is a miracle that the residency exists, and attributes it to the generosity of the community that is accustomed to creating small (and large) miracles with scarce resources.
I visited with the nine July residents and was very impressed with their diversity, experimental approaches and openness to engage with the community. They hail from all over the country, ranging from New York City to Miami and California. The cultural life of Rutland is enhanced by the presence of these prolific artists who appreciate the uniqueness of what Vermont offers. I’ve asked each of them to share a bit of their experience here.
B.A.: How did you feel about organizing a residency so close to COVID? What did you expect when you organized the first one in 2017, and to see where it has come now?
Whitney Ramage, director: Organizing a residency, while still in the throes of COVID, involved a lot of hand wringing. It was a leap of faith. Writing an open call to artists describing a group residency before I had had the courage to venture outside of my apartment was like writing science fiction. To be honest, I wouldn’t have guessed that we’d be in a position to be as open as we are and for that I’m very grateful.
To my surprise and delight, 77ART is coming closer to my original vision. I wanted a grass-roots community-involved art center focused on the cutting edge of contemporary art, a residency program nestled within the city center. I hoped that the residency program would act like an artery, pumping artists through the consciousness of the local community. I wanted to build love for Rutland as a place. Artists come and see a gorgeous and fascinating post-industrial city. They see it as complex and nuanced, raw and inspiring.
The role of the community is everything. 77ART is really by and for the Rutlanders. It’s so inspiring that we’re able to build something out of nothing and that can only happen in a place like Rutland. As of this moment, 77ART has no paid staff, no endowment, no property. It exists purely on the outsized generosity of our community.
Questions to Residents
B.A.: Can you speak to your work with family history and what direction it’s taken you in here? How have the resources available enlarged the scope of your idea?
Gabriel Bielawski: My work attempts to connect to deceased members of my family through mystical Jewish practice and the study of the Kabbalah. The folktale of the Golem tells of a rabbi in Prague who used his studies of the Biblical creation of life to construct a living man out of clay.
While in Rutland, I located an area with high clay content in the soil and filtered it to produce my own workable clay. This type of intimate engagement with material allows me to more closely connect to the physical realities of this ritual.
Access to The MINT as part of this residency has also been incredible in the breadth of tools it has given me to explore different materials.
B.A: Can you talk about your Tibetan origins, its influence on your work and the 108 paintings in your current “Spirit Series?”
Ben Paljor Chatag: I was born in Lhasa, Tibet, and spent a significant part of my childhood there. When I was almost 10, I left my family unexpectedly, walking out of my country. I lived in a Tibetan Boarding School in India with other Tibetan refugee children. At 15, I came to the United States with my grandfather.
My practice reflects the merging of my Tibetan and Western influences. My 108 Series of small watercolors, which I began at 77ART, deals with perceptions or misperceptions. The “108” refers to the number of beads on a Tibetan mala, a string of beads Tibetans use to strengthen their minds. 77ART is the perfect environment to begin this series.
B.A.: I’m interested in your use of patterns of rust on fabric and how access to The MINT has assisted in your work?
Katherine Earl: Patterns are systems of meaning and can serve to communicate significance and worldviews. My rust series portrays indecipherable patterns to urge us to recall some of our collective wisdom. The MINT has provided me with incredible support throughout my time at 77ART. I have been exploring new diverse ways of working, such as in stained glass and letterpress.
Morgan Over and Tom from Sidekick Press have both been phenomenal to work with. Since my rust series is essentially a print project, it has been a true pleasure to learn the letterpress, to contrast and compare these methods of mark making across material and concept.
B.A.: What has it been like to have your own studio space in the residency, as opposed to working at home, and how has it affected your work?
Lizz Hamilton: Having my own dedicated studio space here has really allowed me to make different work than I would be able to make at home. I can spread out, think clearly, and focus my attention and energy on bigger, more complicated projects.
At home, I end up making a lot of artwork just sitting in my living room. I’m often visually — and sometimes physically — fighting with the distractions of daily life, trying to keep the cats out of my work, etc. To have a studio space lets me shed these distractions. I’ve been making work that requires a lot of wall space here. I would not be able to make these otherwise — I’m very grateful.
B.A.: I understand that your work has opened into new directions at the residency with your access to the vacuum-forming machine at The MINT. Could you speak to combining these transparent forms with your projections?
Katie Hubbell: I was very excited to use a vacuum-form machine to create surfaces to project onto. I made sculptures out of clay; then formed the plastic around them. This clear sculptural element will exist with other paper pulp sculptures (that absorb light) in a video installation.
When projecting onto the plastic, the light refracts and scatters across the room. The shadows remind me of images of amoebas flooding the wall in a way that feels cosmic to me. Tom Lichtman at the MINT has been incredibly generous and has taught me in a short period how to master the machine. I’m so excited about the possibilities of this material and very thankful!
B.A.: The residency has allowed you to work in your ceramic sculpture at a larger scale and to bring in the element of light. Can you share some of this experience?
Dayeon Kim: The sculpture piece “Dazzling” was constructed during the height of the pandemic. The hand covering the eyes from blinding light represents how we need to push ourselves to get through these difficult times to a better place. The COVID vacuous headspace inspired me to build a tunnel of hope to traverse, containing a series of illuminated ceramic sculptures.
Being dissatisfied with the limits of static sculpture, I wanted to add other elements to make the work more interactive. Working with the residency and MINT staff as well as engaging with local makers and learning new mediums such as stained glass has enriched my art making practice.
B.A.: You’ve been working on what you call an “improvised painting” during this residency. I was struck by how you feel that this is related to the experiences of the last year.
Steven Pestana: Here at 77ART, I’ve been working on a large sheet of translucent plastic paper called polypropylene that a previous resident left behind. I like being able to work with both sides, creating depth on a flat surface. I thought it was a good opportunity to just experiment and see what would happen.
The process ended up allowing me to try things, which would otherwise digress too far from my usual approach. Each new day was like a story with unpunctuated sentences and no periods at the ends. It became a question of “and then what happens next?” again and again, as I explored the “cloud of unknowing” that we’ve lived in for the last two years.
B.A.: It seems that you found your way to the Carving Studio in West Rutland and have incorporated some marble from there, as well as mirrors and light, in your residency work.
Jonathan Sims: There is something undeniable about the monumentality of stone, and the feeling of timelessness one gets from being near something that feels so much of Earth, and much longer lived than the span of our individual human lives. The old marble quarries at the Carving Studio have literally tons of discarded stone, valueless to the marble industry but an incredible opportunity for an artist like me.
It feels poetic to combine this with light, a medium known for its transience and ephemerality. There is an immediacy in light, and it seems to stir emotions that are buoyant and short-lived. There is an exceptional magic in combining two elements that exist in so many dualistic oppositions.
B.A.: How has the residency affected your work? Your experimentation with motors to activate parts of your sculpture is fascinating.
Sophia Sobers: I wanted to approach my time at 77ART as a blank canvas. Coming to Rutland, I only knew that I wanted to explore utilizing small DC motors and, if time permitted, sound, within sculptural explorations.
Although the residency at 77ART is short (25 days!), it has given me the time and space to finally allow myself to explore how I would want to integrate motors and kinetics into my own work. I stopped in at The MINT for a stained-glass demo and may even incorporate that into my work! Overall, it has been an exciting change of pace to my usual studio practice and has made me feel connected both to Rutland as well as with the wonderful cohort of artists that are here with me.