The Artist in Residence Program at Recology San Francisco will host an exhibition and reception for current artists-in-residence Michael Arcega, Ma Li and student artist Eden V. Evans on Friday, May 22, from 5-9pm (with performance by Ma Li at 7:30pm) and Saturday, May 23, from 1-3pm. Additional viewing hours will be held on Tuesday, May 26, from 5-7pm, with a gallery walk-through with the artists at 6:30pm. This exhibition will be the culmination of four months of work by the artists who have scavenged materials from the dump to make art and promote recycling and reuse.
Michael Arcega: Recologica: A Nacireman Excavation
In his most recent work, interdisciplinary artist Michael Arcega employs the term Nacirema (American spelled backwards), coined by Horace Mitchell Miner in a 1956 paper that satirized the anthropological study of world cultures that emphasized “otherness,” influencing generations of anthropologists and social scientists. Like Miner, Arcega approaches North Americans as a strange people whose practices and rituals must be studied and understood. Though a socio-political critique, Arcega’s work also has a playful element, providing familiar entry points to alternative ways of thinking about those who colonize the landscape.
Ma Li: Meet You at the Bird Bridge in the Milky Way
While at Recology, Ma Li has created a living installation that attempts to connect her sculpture to the community, providing space for people to build relationships with materials, the environment, and each other. The work will happen in two parts. First, at Recology, where those attending the opening reception on Friday May 22 will participate in a choreographed performance at 7:30pm, and finally, at the Asian Art Museum on May 28 from 6:30-9pm, where the installation will be assembled.
The project was inspired by an interaction the artist had with a customer who, while dumping off materials, gave her a box. When she opened it, she found beautiful faux birds and flowers, and was reminded of the Chinese phrase, niăo yŭ huā xiāng (birds singing, flowers blooming), used to describe an auspicious spring day. With this gift, along with foam, plastic water bottles, window blinds, cardboard tubes, and other materials, Ma Li has created a magical version of an idyllic spring. Her work also connects to the Chinese story of the Cow Herder and the Weaver Maid, lovers separated by a river of stars created by the maid’s mother, the queen of the heavens. Small birds, so moved by the couple’s love, flew together forming a bridge over the celestial river, enabling the lovers to be reunited. Ma Li hopes participants in her project, like the birds, serve as agents of greater social and environmental connectivity.
Eden V. Evans: Momento
In sculpture, installation, and textile works, Eden V. Evans addresses ideas of memory, and how our recollections of past experiences continue to shape our present selves. Working with the term momento, a variant spelling of memento, Evans has created artworks that explore specific moments in time and connect to her own experiences. Work is personal, yet universal, and speaks to issues of absence, loss and mortality, and the indelible marks these events leave on all of us. Says Evans, “because my most prominent memories are related to grief and loss, there is a tone of what used to be, but I'm often juxtaposing it with what is now.”
About the Recology Artist in Residence Program
The Artist in Residence Program at Recology San Francisco is a one-of-a-kind program established in 1990 to encourage the conservation of natural resources and instill a greater appreciation for the environment and art in children and adults. Artists work for four months in studio space on site, use materials recovered from the Public Disposal and Recycling Area, and speak to students and the general public. Over one-hundred professional Bay Area artists have completed residencies. Applications are accepted annually, June through August.
