The Harn Museum of Art
Gainesville, FL
352-392-9826
http://www.harn.ufl.edu/
The Swamp: On the Edge of Eden
September 29, 2000-January 7, 2001
This exhibition presents historic and contemporary art engaging
the unique landscape of the swamp as a place of primordial beauty and a
contested site for environmental exploitation. Tied to the specific history
and topography of Southeastern swamplands, the exhibition also links to
more universal concerns. Notions of natural and unnatural, fantasy and reality
are of particular concern in places such as Florida where nature has been
replaced and reconstructed in an expanding network of theme parks.
(left: Maud Gatewood, Above a Small Swamp, 1992, acrylic on canvas,
60 x 72 inches, photograph by Melva Calder, courtesy of St. John's Museum
of Art, Wilmington, North Carolina)
This intriguing and timely exhibit features 62 works of
art including painting, sculpture, photography, and installation 
work
by recognized and emerging artists. The historic section of the exhibition
features paintings by major American landscape artists from the mid 19th-
to the mid 20th-century, including works by Martin Johnson Heade, Winslow
Homer, and Thomas Moran whose depictions of the southern wilderness contributed
to America's popular vision. (right: Martin Johnson Heade, The
Great Florida Marsh, 1885, oil on canvas, 28 3/8 x 54 3/8 inches, lent
by The Flagler System, Inc., Palm Beach, Florida, photo courtesy: North
Carolina Museum of Art)
Contemporary works by artists including Naomi Fisher, Robert
Cober, Sally Mann, and Robert Rauschenberg, provide diverse perspectives
on the swamp, with visions that juxtapose a longing for "paradise"
with an acute awareness of threatening environmental degradation. The works
range from the realistic to the fantastic, from panoramic visions to microscopic
investigations, examining the fragile and sometimes volatile interaction
of man and nature.
An illustrated catalogue accompanies the exhibition to
provide a multi-disciplinary understanding of the swamp from art and literary
texts, scientific journals and other sources on the native ecology. The
catalogue includes essays by art historian Lucy Lippard, cultural historians
David Miller and Gregory Ulmer, and wetland ecologist Katherine Ewel.
The Swamp: On the Edge of Eden,
organized by the Harn Museum and curated by Kerry Oliver-Smith, curator
of contemporary art, closes on January 7, 2001. The exhibition will travel
to the Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens, Jacksonville, Florida (February
7-April 15, 2001).
The exhibition and catalogue are sponsored by Academic
Affairs, University of Florida; with support from the State of Florida,
Florida Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs and the Florida
Arts Council; with additional funding from the Elizabeth Firestone Graham
Foundation.
rev. 10/9/00
The Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art is located on the University
of Florida campus at SW 34th Street and Hull Road. (PO Box 11270, Gainesville,
FL 32611-2700). Admission is free. Call the museum for hours. (information
as of 10/00).
Please click on thumbnail images bordered by a red line
to see enlargements.
For further biographical information on selected artists
cited above please see America's Distinguished
Artists, a national registry of historic artists.
Unless otherwise noted, all text and image materials
relating to the above institutional source were provided by that source.
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This exhibition presents historic and contemporary art engaging
the unique landscape of the swamp as a place of primordial beauty and a
contested site for environmental exploitation. Tied to the specific history
and topography of Southeastern swamplands, the exhibition also links to
more universal concerns. Notions of natural and unnatural, fantasy and reality
are of particular concern in places such as Florida where nature has been
replaced and reconstructed in an expanding network of theme parks.
(left: Maud Gatewood, Above a Small Swamp, 1992, acrylic on canvas,
60 x 72 inches, photograph by Melva Calder, courtesy of St. John's Museum
of Art, Wilmington, North Carolina)