BEVERLY AARONS
Multidisciplinary Artist — Merging Story, Games, and Social Practice
Hello everyone! Here’s the latest happenings in my artistic practice this summer. If you’re receiving this email I’ve probably met you at some point or at some event in the past. Whether I’m working as a journalist, novelist, playwright, game developer, or creating experiential events for community, I’m connecting to amazing people so that’s why you’re receiving this email. Below are just a few of my updates:
Reading New Work @ Hedreen Gallery – August 15, 2019 @ 7pm
I will be reading new work (fiction and nonfiction) at Hedreen Gallery on August 15, 2019 at 7pm as part of the opening night of Carol R. Williams’ amazing art show which is an exhibition of immersive artworks that combines and contextualizes Williams’ installation works from recent years with a new body of work in monoprint, painting and sculpture created onsite at Seattle University. I was invited by Carol and Seattle University to write a fictional/nonfiction piece to accompany Carol’s exhibit. I look forward to presenting that work. See press release below my updates.
VR Demo @ Pacific Science Center – August 18, 2019 11am – 1pm
I will be demoing one of my Virtual Reality experiences at the Pacific Science Center’s Curiosity Expo on August 18, 2019 11am – 1pm. Come visit me at the Seattle Indies booth!
Documentary About Teaching Kids VR — I’m In It!!
As I mentioned last quarter, I worked with Arts Corps and Reel Grrls’ LIT program to teach young people how to develop games for VR in the Fall/Spring 2019 school year.
Here is a short documentary about what we did at LIT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxf54IFELWw&feature=youtu.be
Stories of Migration Project Update
As some of you know, I am working on an interactive and immersive theatrical experience that explores Stories of Migration. So far, I’ve conducted interviews with individuals from countries around the world such as China, Bosnia, Syria, Kenya, and Ethiopia. I am currently looking to interview Hispanics from Mexico, Central and South American and Pacific Islanders who have migrated to the Shoreline-Lake Forest Park area. I’m also searching for African Americans whose family migrated from the South to the Shoreline-Lake Forest Park area and I’m looking to interview Indigenous individuals whose family has a historical connection to the Shoreline-Lake Forest Park area. If you know anyone who would be a good match, please have them contact me at [email protected].
Press release for Hedreen Gallery event:
Hedreen Gallery
Lee Center for the Arts (CNFA)
901 12th Avenue
Seattle, Washington, 98122
(between Marion St and Spring St)
Hedreen Gallery Open Hours: Wed- Sat 1:00-6:00 PM
(Vachon Gallery Open Hours 9-5pm Mon- Friday)
Gallery Phone: 206-296-2244
Press Contact:
Molly Mac, Hedreen Gallery Curator, SU Galleries Curator
Email: [email protected] | Cell: 646-744-9483
August 8, 2019: Seattle University Department of Art, Art History and Design hosts Carol Rashawnna Williams for a summer SUVAIR residency and two-part exhibition series: For the record,
Carol Rashawnna Williams is a Seattle-based, interdisciplinary artist who makes work that engages audiences in conversations about social, environmental, and racial justice. While in residence at Seattle University, Williams will create two dynamic art installations that include prints, paintings and sculptures made of primarily recycled or reused materials. These participatory exhibitions are free and open to the public.
Carol Rashawnna Williams | For the record,
Hedreen Gallery
RUN DATES: AUG 16- SEPT 14
Opening Reception & reading: August 15th, 2019 (6-8pm, Readings 7pm)
Vachon Gallery
RUN DATES: SEPT 23- OCT 11
Closing Reception: Thursday, Oct 10, 2019 (4-7pm)
Throughout her collaborative interdisciplinary practice, Carol Rashawnna Williams contends that the only way to shift race relations and understand climate change is through collective imaginings and re-imaginings of equitable relationships to the land, animals and resources. Williams’ aesthetic forms fall, swim, fly, drip and grow through various layers of reality, spirituality and data analysis. Her narrative installations reject the tidy, toxic logic of scarcity models, suggesting powerful alternatives in collective storytelling, collective ownership, collective re-valuing of biospecies and collective commitments to sustainable environmental practices over time.
At Hedreen Gallery (8/16/19-9/14/19) Williams presents an exhibition of immersive artworks that combines and contextualizes Williams’ installation works from recent years with a new body of work in monoprint, painting and sculpture created onsite at Seattle University. This exhibition will be accompanied by a new written work by Beverly Aarons. The opening celebration on August 15th will include readings from Aarons and ChrisTiana ObeySumner at 7pm.
At Vachon Gallery (9/23/19- 10/11/19) Williams extends the inquiry of the Hedreen exhibition to build a second, participatory installation that engages the public and Seattle University community in dialogue around the connections between race and climate justice. Williams asks:
What experiences have you experienced with racial tension and climate justice?
What equitable solutions do you see to these challenges?
How can you shift the paradigm for the common good?
Artist Bio: Carol Rashawnna Williams (Seattle) was born in Topeka, Kansas into a military family. She lived in Germany until the age of 11, when her family relocated to Tacoma. Carol graduated from Evergreen State College, and was immediately accepted into Vista-Americorps in Seattle’s White Center neighborhood, where she worked with young, single mothers of Head Start.
After moving to Seattle, Carol became a mother herself. She resides in the TK Lofts in Pioneer Square and works to mentor emerging artists from various backgrounds. Carol believes in the power of art to build community, bridge community relationships, and create authentic space for healing. A large body of her work deals with environmentalism, PNW conifers, old growth trees, endangered animals, and climate change. Carol was certified through the City of Seattle Parks & Recreation Urban Forest Educator Program and loves to teach about conifers, indigenous and invasive species. You can find her walking all over Seattle.
Carol earned a 4Culture Conductive Garboil Award (2018), an Artist Residency AADK Spain (2018), a 4Culture Artist Community Grant Award (2017) and was accepted to Seattle Office of Arts & Culture’s Public Art Boot Camp (2018). She is the owner of K-Love 4 Art, co-founder of both Race & Climate Justice Art Collective and ARTifACTS, and the Co-Executive Director at Community Arts Create. She was recently accepted in the Environmental Leadership Program, a yearlong national fellowship to support emerging leaders in environmental justice.
About the SUVAIR Program: The Seattle University Artist in Residence program was formed to facilitate research and support for artists in their creative process. This program, funded by the Pigott Family Endowment for the Arts, is designed to foster a unique environment for artists and students from which new ideas emerge that can change the way we see the world. The residency provides artists with the valuable resources of time and space for open-ended investigation, experimentation and collaboration. The program gives artists the opportunity to push the boundaries of their own practice. This freedom we hope will foster collaborations that promote new approaches to arts education, foster community building, and provide a catalyst for social change. The SUVAIR creates a forum for dialogue between the public and the artist in residence through studio space, experimental exhibitions and other forms of public programming and materials.
GALLERY ACCESS AND DIRECTIONS:
Hedreen Gallery is a street facing gallery in the Lee Center for the Arts. The entrance is at the north end of the building. Doors are unlocked and phones are answered during gallery open hours (1-6pm Wed-Saturday) and during theatre productions. 2 Hour Parking is available on the street and visitor parking is available in Seattle University parking lots.
Hedreen Gallery is wheelchair accessible. For questions about accessibility or to request accommodations please contact Seattle University Galleries Curator Molly Mac ([email protected]). One week notice of need for accommodations is requested.
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Vachon Gallery is located inside the FINR building at Seattle University. FINR is just off of Madison Street at the corner where 10th Avenue meets the SU Campus. (across the street from IHOP) The main entrance is on the campus-facing side of the building across from the dog park. 2 Hour Parking is available on the street and paid visitor parking is available in Seattle University parking lots.
While the main door to the Vachon Gallery has 3 steps up, Vachon Gallery does have a wheelchair accessible entrance with no steps. Please inquire at the FINR front desk if you need assistance. For other questions about accessibility or to request accommodations please contact Seattle University Galleries Curator Molly Mac ([email protected]). Two weeks advance notice of need for accommodations is requested.