NO NATURE
NO NATURE JANUARY 21ST - MARCH 4TH
Regiane Donadio Katherine Emely Gomez Alonsa Guevara Jessica Maffia Palén Obesa Sima Schloss Curated by Rachel Sydlowski CURATOR STATEMENT The Bronx is often depicted as a critical mass of urban environments, but anyone who has traversed the depths of Van Cortlandt Park, navigated the waters of the Bronx River or walked the shores of Twin Island knows that this borough is one of dualities. One can see the geological scars of prehistory just by observing the echoes of the retreating ice age in the land’s complex elevations and topologies. Each artist in this exhibition considers their relationship to nature and the city. Sculptures, paintings, and site-specific artworks exist as opposing but connected strands in a double helix of seeking solace and restoration within natural environments and existing as an artist within a major metropolis. The title of this exhibition is taken from a book of poems No Nature, by Gary Snyder. Snyder’s poems are a popular companion to those seeking enlightenment and mindfulness. The poems and the artworks in this exhibition consider a reflective
existence, one that weighs the lifespan of the universe and not the singular arc of ego and the emptiness of conspicuous consumption. Yet, there is a trick within the homonym of “no” and “know”. It is both that we are part of nature and also that through the act of seeking, we become better at knowing and observing the cosmic and biological systems relationships that bind us to this earth and beyond. This group of artists are apt observers and seekers, they are High Priestesses of intuition with their hand in both worlds. Their alchemy is mixing polarities of nature and the metropolis the outcome being greater than the sum of its parts. Made from the earth itself, Regiane Donadio’s clay sculptures intertwine the figure with roots and foliage, emphasizing the duality of human existence. They reveal a fragile balance, both describing the state in which individuals reject the natural world as part of their inherent existence while simultaneously reinforcing this undeniable connection. Equal parts artist, naturalist and historian, Jessica Maffia walks the land of New York City in search of evidence illuminating the vibrant storied past through observing and documenting flora and fauna. No plant sprouting from cracks in the sidewalk is too small for her piercing investigations and no city park is too big for her to scour its outer edges. Artworks from two different series are presented, Walking Broadway and Joy. In Walking Broadway, the artist documents their encounters with plants and wildlife through photography as they walk the length of Manhattan. Entries range from Callery pear to New York aster and prints left by birds walking across wet concrete. An ongoing large-scale textile, Joy, the silhouette of a figure is filled with embroidered flowers and plants. This artwork was initiated during the early stages of the pandemic, as Maffia taught herself a variety of complex embroidery techniques, engaging with the process of recreating floral imagery.
Engaging with intuitive processes, Sima Schloss, covers a series of street-facing windows with a site-specific drawing created specifically for this exhibition. Using exclusively contour lines for which the artist is associated, the composition is intertwined with brightly colored abstract faces and leaves. The act of drawing is automated, where the primordial impulse of mark-making is activated. The drawings engage with abstraction, patterns and create a rhythm echoed in cell structures, architetcure and the patterns of daily life. A series of prints, by artist Palén Obesa, narrate a discourse about the cycles of life, and ephemerality through a complex visual language that pairs the human form in various states. Epic in scope with mythological elements, the potent images describe otherwise macabre subject matter such as bodies being reclaimed by the earth through decomposition as a part of the necessary and regenerative cycle. In other images, humans ride fantastical beasts as the beasts capture prey, or a seated female figure faces a reflection of her own skeleton, a likely portal to another world. Using digital media and photography in Antidote, Katherine Emely Gomez turns the lens on herself to create a linear description of the seasons. This serialized self-portrait illustrates the full spectrum of seasonal changes and the importance of time as a restorative medicine. Symbolizing transformation, strength and sentiment of identity, the artist returned to the same location for over two years, photographing herself in a variety of poses against the changing landscape, documenting the cycles of dormancy and growth. Symmetry and balance form the main compositional structures of Alonsa Guevara’s vibrant, large-scale paintings. Flowers, fruits and insects comprise complex mandala-like diadems. The crowns are constructed of natural materials referencing ceremony and reinforcing
the connection between humankind, nature and spirituality. The lower portions of both paintings are anchored by the physical presence of women who wear these elaborate crowns, as the composition resolves just below the eyes. This moment in each painting is one of reckoning and understanding where the intrinsic connection to nature outweighs the applied and acquired modes of societal existence. Different facets of nature play an integral role in each artists’ practice; creating ceremony, engaging in restorative properties, recognizing intuitive processes, exploring regenerative cycles, and creating taxonomies through observational experiences. Living within the metropolis a commonality is formed, a shared philosophical tenet emerges about the relationship of humanity within larger systems. The artists’ prescient observations and kinship with nature, are also cautionary. The artworks offer a recalculation in an off-kilter epoch, an opportunity for balance, harmony, and repositioning of humanity within the universe.
CURATOR BIO Based in New York City, Rachel Sydlowski is a visual artist and educator. Recent exhibitions include Facebook Open Arts, Wassaic Project, Dyckman Farmhouse Museum, Chashama Space to Connect: Fordham Windows Project, Wave Hill Sunroom Project Space, The Bronx Museum of the Arts, New York Public Library, and Lehman College Art Gallery. Curatorial projects include Intersecting Editions at The Castle Gallery, History of the Present at OSilas Gallery and Infinite Archive, NYPL at the 115th Street Harry Belafonte Library.
PUBLIC PROGRAMS Opening Friday, January 21st, 2022 Viewing Days/Times: Tuesdays - Thursdays 11:00 AM - 5:00 PM and Saturdays 12:00 PM - 4:00 PM Public Program - Beginner Embroidery Thursday, February 17th, 2022 | 6:00 PM - 7:30 PM Culminating Celebration Friday, March 4th, 2022 | 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Bronx Council on the Arts 2700 E. Tremont Ave. Bronx, NY, 10461 Longwood Art Gallery @ Hostos Pop-Up This exhibition is by appointment only. For more informationt contact: longwood@bronxarts.org
Longwood Arts Project The Longwood Arts Project is the contemporary visual arts program of the Bronx Council on the Arts, with the mission to support artists and their work, especially emerging artists from underrepresented groups, such as people of color, the LGBT* community, and women. The Longwood Art Gallery @ Hostos presents solo and group exhibitions of works of art produced in various media, through interdisciplinary practices that connect emerging artists, communities, and ideas within and beyond The Bronx.
The Bronx Council on the Arts Founded by visionary community leaders in 1962, The Bronx Council on the Arts (BCA) is a pioneer in advancing cultural equity in The Bronx. From our early beginnings as a presenter of affordable arts programming in select Bronx neighborhoods, we have grown into a cultural hub that serves the entire creative ecosystem of the borough. Our programs serve artists, the public, and the field at large by building connections, providing resources, and advocating for equitable practices. Then as now, we focus on supporting the work of underrepresented groups – especially artists of color, women, and members of the LGBTQ+ community. Through this lens we offer affordable programs for seniors and youth, and provide direct services to over 1,500 artists and 250 community-based arts groups each year. www.bronxarts.org The Hostos Center for the Arts and Culture An integral part of Hostos Community College/CUNY since 1982, the Hostos Center for the Arts & Culture, which includes two state-of-the-art theaters of 900 and 360 seats each, a black box experimental theater, and a museum-grade art gallery, is a resource for students and faculty in addition to serving the cultural needs of South Bronx residents and neighboring communities. Recognized nationally as a leader in Latin and African-based programming, the Hostos Center creates performing and visual arts forums in which the diverse cultural heritages of its audiences are celebrated and cultivated. In meeting that objective, the Center is dedicated to the development of emerging artists and the creation of new work. www.hostoscenter.org
LONGWOOD ART GALLERY @ HOSTOS YOUTH ENGAGEMENT PROGRAM Longwood’s Youth Engagement Program, launched in 2018, is designed to engage Bronx youth with the rich visual arts scene that surrounds them. By providing gallery experiences they can relate to – and interactions with artists who reside in the same neighborhoods, share similar cultural identities, and even nations of origin – young people gain formative experiences of cultural engagement that last a lifetime. Activities are free, age-appropriate, and created by professional teaching artists to foster critical thinking, interviewing and public speaking skills. If your organization, school, or group works with youth and would like to discuss scheduling a workshop or to arrange a visit, connect with us ! Contact longwood@bronxarts.org to schedule a workshop for your group. Workshops are best suited for participants ages 1425. Online workshops are coming soon!
Illustration by Ruben Ramirez
REGIANE DONADIO Artist Bio Born in Sao Paulo and based in New York since 2010. Regiane Donadio’s pursued a BFA in Ceramics and Sculpture in the Art Department of Lehman College, CUNY, where she began working with clay in 2016. In 2018, Donadio was the winner of the Will Barnet First Prize at the National Arts Club Student Show, and in the summer of 2019, the National Arts Club, NYC hosted her debut solo exhibition. Donadio is currently pursuing her MFA in Sculpture at the New York Academy of Art, class of 2021.
Regiane Donadio, Introspections on Symbiosis, 2018, Ceramic, 17in x 8in x 8in.
Artist Statement “My sculptures explore the nuances and ambiguities of humanity’s relationship to nature with the understanding that humans are subject to nature. Inspired by the symbiotic relationships that sustain life in nature and concerns with the current environmental challenges, my work
highlights the intrinsic physical and emotional connection we share with nature within and around ourselves. “The human figures intertwined in tree roots and treetops bursting out of their heads and bodies emphasize the duality of human existence and reveals the fragility of human condition at the point of disequilibrium in which individuals reject the natural world and our own nature as something that is not an inherent part of us. They invite the viewers to shift their perspective from contemporary ethos of otherness towards the understanding of the inseparable essence of the human and nature relationship.”
PALÉN OBESA Artist Bio Palén Obesa [Paloma Leida Natividad Obergh Santos] is a visual artist who works and lives in the Bronx, NY. She received her BFA in painting and drawing, and minor in art history at SUNY Purchase College in 2017. Obesa was originally born in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic and immigrated to the United States at the age of fifteen. Through her practice, Obesa has been exploring multiple themes that can be controversial, ominous or too complex to discuss. By doing so, she hopes to open wider and less biased conversations about them. Some of these topics include womanhood and what does it mean to be a female, and adultcentrism and its negative effects on children. By addressing patriotism and cultural identity, she also comments on the hybrid society of immigrants who are struggling with cultural assimilation, language acquisition and racism. Obesa’s work has been exhibited in multiple venues through New York, including the Bronx Library Center- where she hosted her first solo show,the Nathan Cummings Foundation, Mount Vernon Hotel Museum & Garden, HACO NYC and Gitler_____& Gallery. She participated in the printmaking collective, Conejo Grafico Nacional’s print portfolios, Perro Mundo/Raw World (2019) and Los Americans: same=different (2022) as a guest artist for the sfernandez Press & Taller and Coronado printstudio respectivelly. Artist Statement “Obesa makes images that derive from daydreams, inner monologues and intrusive thoughts. Her work serves as a vehicle to explore, explain and cope with trauma and its repercussions to the identity, resulting in imagery that can be ominous, crude or blunt. “Compelled by timeless themes, her body of work explores topics like death, mental health and chronic pain. As an immigrant, she also
addresses the concerns relating to the movement of peoples across borders and the identity alterations this creates. Obesa hopes to immerse the viewer in her intimate visual imagery in order to open wider and less biased conversations about these topics.”
Palén Obesa, DK, 2021, Linocut, Published at Coronado print studio and René de los Santos’ studio, 8in x 14in.
KATHERINE EMELY GOMEZ Artist Bio Over the past nine years, Katherine Emely Gomez’s work has been selected for presentations locally and across several states— from New York to Colorado in over 15 art gallery exhibitions, including a solo show at Chashama in Harlem, NY. Gomez has participated in the Openings NY Artist Residency program for two summers and is a recipient of a Chashama Artist Grant and En Foco PDI honorarium. Gómez is a contemporary artist who seeks to create a different view of self-portraiture and dreamlike imagery using photography and oil paints. She explores how environment, culture, life events, grief, love, and imagination are as important to one’s own identity as a given name at birth. Her portraits themselves embody self-transformations, exploration and reflection inspired by twin loss. As an identical twinless twin, her image has come to represent three entities: her sister, her twin hood, and herself. Her installations are designed to transport the viewers into understanding the perception of losing your “Twinship”. An immersive experience using symbolic objects, mirrors and furniture. Her latest artworks portray symbolism of strength and spiritual essence while using a combination of expressionistic painting and photographic realism. She holds a BFA and MFA from the City University of New York, Lehman College in The Bronx. Her artworks was recently exhibited at Local Project Art Space in Long Island City, NY, and the Maritime Garage Gallery in South Norwalk, CT, among others. She has curated exhibitions at the Living Gallery in Brooklyn and St. Paul the Apostle, Upper West Side, NY. Her story and artworks were broadcasted at NY1 Noticias, News12 and written by Hartford Courant to name a few. Artist Statement “My Antidote portrait is an 8-foot-long art piece portrait that illustrates
the four seasons and the importance of time as the best medicine. Tracking the importance of prioritizing continuous events and changes is reflected within the different times of day. Each pose is independently unique and the change of colors per season symbolizes transformation, strength, and sentiment of identity.
Katherine Emely Gomez, Antidote, 2021, Digital photography printed on paper 14in X 9ft.
“My digital photography portraits focus on my personal life experiences inspired from a fictional imagined vantage point. For instance, seeking to find ways to make the invisible visible, transcending time by playing with memories and images from my past and present in order to come to a conclusion about how my future will look as a Twinless Twin. “My artworks relate to intuitive thought, emptiness and cognitive awareness: the feeling that time has stopped, or of an alternate dreamlike universe. Other aspects of my work display symbolic references of light, objects and shadows connected to spiritual essence. This piece took over two years to create while going to the site throughout the summer, fall, winter and spring. It was therapeutic, hands on and very involved.”
JESSICA MAFFIA Artist Bio Jessica Maffia is a visual artist born and raised in New York City. She works across a wide variety of media to celebrate the familiar and honor the natural world of the city, through repetitive, meditative processes. Her work has been exhibited throughout the US and is currently in the Flat Files of Pierogi Gallery in downtown Manhattan. She created the artwork for musician Childish Gambino’s two singles Summertime Magic and Feels Like Summer. Maffia is the recipient of numerous artist residency fellowships including at the Albee Foundation and the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, as well as two grants from the Hells Kitchen Foundation. Her work is featured on the covers of Fabio Gironi’s philosophy book Naturalizing Badiou: Mathematical Ontology and Structural Realism and poet Firas Sulaiman’s latest book As if My Name is a Mistaken Sign. She recently completed a permanent public installation for the Audubon Mural Project. Artist Statement “My body is a map on which I inscribe my inner landscape. I am conducting a thorough psychological excavation using nature as metaphor for psyche. I am curious about the wilderness within me, exploring the porous boundaries between humans and the natural world, and rendering visible my own cellular memory. I am teasing apart my dense layers of selves in order to tell the litany of stories that my body holds from which a sense of a single self is derived. “I conducted a photoshoot in which I photographed myself embodying specific memories, emotions, and experiences. This manifested in a series of over 500 greatly varied poses. The most salient poses become small paper silhouettes. The most resonant of these small silhouettes become large silhouettes onto which I draw, paint, print, cut, embroider, etc. elements from Nature to express my inner nature. “I am hungry to know the wild around me. To connect to the wisdom
of the non-human and the poetry of the natural world. There is a misconception that this once lush city is devoid of nature. It is important that we recognize what does live here because cultivating a relationship with nature is not a privilege or a luxury but a basic, fundamental physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual, need. Towards this end, I set off on a pilgrimage to recognize and honor the natural world of New York. I have walked 15 miles of Broadway in Manhattan and the Bronx and photographed an element of nature on every block. The task required that I look slowly and carefully, sometimes pausing at great length in observation. Each image has been printed out and cut into a circle. The circle connotes a portal, a microscope or a telescope; I am asking you to look closer with me.
Jessica Maffia, Walking Broadway, Bald Cypress (left) Zelkova LeavesLispenard (right), 2020, Photograph and pencil on paper, 10in x 8in.
Broadway is not only a long street (it spans the length of Manhattan, the Bronx, Westchester and beyond), it also has a long history. It was well-trodden by the Lenape for millenia prior to Dutch colonization. They called it the Wickquasgeck Trail. When it existed as such, Broadway meandered through lush forests of extraordinary biodiversity. New York City was an ecological paradise! This act of walking Broadway acknowledges the nature that presently exists while quietly holding the knowledge of what once thrived and is now lost. This series is comprised of over 300 works, 3 of which are on exhibition here.”
ALONSA GUEVARA Artist Bio Alonsa Guevara is a New York-based artist originally from Rancagua, Chile. Her paintings are a window to an imaginary universe where the lines between fantasy and reality are blurred. Guevara’s work explores questions of womanhood, identity and belonging while celebrating the connection between humankind and nature. Her main inspiration derives from the experiences of living in three different countries, and is especially impacted by the formative memories of her childhood spent living in the Ecuadorian rainforest with her family. After living in Ecuador for seven years, Alonsa moved back to Chile to receive her BFA from the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile in 2009. In 2011, she moved to New York to complete the MFA Program at the New York Academy of Art. She was awarded the Elizabeth Greenshields Grant in 2013 and received the Academy’s Fellowship award in 2015. Alonsa’s work has been published in Forbes Magazine, Time Out NYC Magazine, VICE, among others and has exhibited internationally, including China, Mexico, Denmark, Argentina and Chile. Her most recent solo show Apparitions was in February 2021 at Anna Zorina Gallery in NYC. Artist Statement My work is a celebration of the beauty and complexity of the natural world as well as an investigation of the vital connection between nature, humans, and our spirituality. As a Latin-American woman that has lived in three countries, each with a unique society, culture and landscape, my work explores questions about identity, belonging and womanhood while offering my own understanding and appreciation of beauty. I use painting as a tool to depict magical worlds that invite viewers to enter a space where there are no limits between reality and fantasy, and where they can find their personal connection to each piece.
In my work, I often depict imaginary rites in which people perform ceremonies to honor feminine energy, fertility, and the cycles of life. In these paintings, flora, fauna, fungi, and human bodies embrace each other, commemorating the connection between humankind and nature, a relationship that has weakened with the passage of time.
Alonsa Guevara, Nectar Crown Detail, Provided by the Anna Zorina Gallery, 2019, Oil on canvas, 60in x 48in.
SIMA SCHLOSS Artist Bio Sima Schloss has been making art since childhood. She received her MFA in Painting. This included a capstone exhibition from Lehman College Art Gallery in Bronx, NY and has been featured in group exhibitions and art fairs throughout the United States. She is currently represented by Beacon Gallery in Boston, Massachusetts.
Sima Schloss, Cadence, Site-specific installation, 2022, Window marker on glass.
Artist Statement My work is a bridge between abstraction and figuration. The abstraction
of a figurative piece allows my mind to be free and unfettered. This allows me a sense of fearlessness because there’s no preconceived notion of what the end will be. With no preconceived notion of the end product, my figurative work is allowed to take its own shape and form in a way similar to how an abstract painting emerges from the canvas, rather than is planned by the artist. I work from a real or imagined figure and then add layers to it. Essentially my figures are just shapes. I start with the basic forms and respond to them. Because I am working on the figure as an abstraction rather than as a portrait per se, it allows me to create imagined beings using non-traditional materials. Rather than reproducing a person or a “look” I seek to recreate emotions, experiences, or moments in our shared experiences. These moments are
NO NATURE All works courtesy of the artists unless otherwise noted.
Regiane Donadio Elemental Entanglements, 2018 Ceramic 34in x 48in x 25in
Regiane Donadio Introspections on Symbiosis, 2018 Ceramic 17in x 8in x 8in
Regiane Donadio Reverie, 2019 Ceramic 69in x 22in x 35in
Regiane Donadio Verdant Contemplation, 2019 Ceramic 24in x 15in x 15in
Katherine Emely Gomez Antidote, 2021 Digital photography printed on paper 14in X 9ft
Alonsa Guevara Womb Crown, Provided by the Anna Zorina Gallery, 2019 Oil on canvas 60in x 48in
Alonsa Guevara Nectar Crown, Provided by the Anna Zorina Gallery, 2019 Oil on canvas 60in x 48in
Jessica Maffia Joy (in progress), 2019-present Embroidery, dye and fabric
Jessica Maffia Walking Broadway, Bird Prints, 2020 Photograph and pencil on paper 10in x 8in
Jessica Maffia Walking Broadway, Zelkova LeavesLispenard, 2020 Photograph and pencil on paper 10in x 8in
Jessica Maffia Walking Broadway, Bald Cypress, 2020 Photograph and pencil on paper 10in x 8in
Palén Obesa La niña con miedo, 2021 Linocut 12in x 12in
Palén Obesa DK, 2021 Linocut, Published at Coronado print studio and René de los Santos’ studio 8in x 14in
Palén Obesa Kindhearted, 2021 Linocut 15in x 11in
Sima Schloss Cadence, Site-specific installation, 2022 Window marker on glass Dimensions variable
The Bronx Council on the Arts is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council; New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature; Arts Midwest and the National Endowment for the Arts; The Coalition of Theaters of Color, City Councilmember Eric Dinowitz and former Councilwoman Vanessa Gibson and NYS Assemblymember Michael Benedetto and the NYS Division of Criminal Justice. Also supported in part by the New Yankee Stadium Community Benefits Fund, Con Edison, the Howard Gilman Foundation, the Mertz Gilmore Foundation, the Lilly Auchincloss Foundation, and the Hispanic Federation, the City of New York, the Department of Youth and Community Development, and Amazon. Special thanks to Hostos Community College and the Hostos Center for the Arts & Culture for their support. Bronx Council on the Arts 2700 E Tremont Ave Bronx, New York 10461 www. bronxarts.org @BronxArtsOrg
Cover Image Credit: Alonsa Guevara, Womb Crown, Provided by the Anna Zorina Gallery, 2019, Oil on canvas, 60in x 48in.