Gallery Opening on First Friday, August 2, 5-8 PM
Gallery Opening is Free & Open to All, with Works Available for Purchase
Exhibiting in the Main Gallery through August

To view & purchase artwork, visit: https://givergy.us/CrackleBinghamKathrineEmeryAUG2024/

The ZACC is proud to present SOLIPHILIA: Finding Ourselves in Nature, works by Crackle Bingham & Katherine Emery, in the Main Gallery throughout August. Works are available for purchase, and the artists will be present at the opening reception.

ABOUT THE ART
Solastalgia is a term coined for the emotional and existential distress caused by environmental change.  Our project, Soliphilia, flips the coin to one of hope, not despair. Soliphilia begins with love from one’s own place (topophilia) to the whole: an awareness of interrelatedness and connection to all. We consider how we can combine a love of place with a natural desire to protect and conserve the beauty around us.

Crackle Bingham’s creative practice is rooted in an emotional and spiritual approach to environmentalism.  Katherine Emery’s practice is based on the belief that humans are social creatures, that seek to connect, and make sense of our world through stories. Together we have collaborated for a year to explore how to find hope in face of climate change. 

“Our project has been greatly influenced by our individual lives and places we call home. Katherine is based on Mount Desert Island, Maine and Crackle is located in Missoula, Montana. Both are mothers, but to children in very different stages of life. Katherine was born and raised in the United States, Crackle was born and raised in the United Kingdom and then emigrated to New Zealand, before landing through marriage in the United States.

Over the course of a year, we have had conversations, shared prompts back and forth, offered reflections in writing and photography, with the intent to celebrate the inherent qualities of joy, resilience, connection, survival, renewal and beauty in nature. 

Each month our work has been guided by a one-word prompt: rebel, shed, cradle, forgiveness, peace, notice, reconnect, mapping, vibration, forage, still and illuminate. The work we created was in response to these prompts: writing, sewing, weaving, collage, painting and printmaking. 

We have witnessed, firsthand, how making can heal and transform ourselves and allow joy to radiate through the work itself – resulting in art and inspiration that may offer hope and healing to others. You are invited to collaborate in this exhibit. There will be prompts for you to engage with the work and bring your own reflections to the conversation.”

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

CRACKLE BINGHAM
Crackle Bingham is a transdisciplinary artist, based in Missoula, Montana. She works with photographic media, printmaking techniques, stitching, book arts, video, and installation. Her work explores the ecological grief and anxiety of climate change. Crackle seeks to find ways that art can contribute positively to the conversation and help decrease anxiety associated with the Anthropocene.

KATHERINE EMERY
Katherine Emery is a photographer, writer and printmaker, interested in the fibers connecting self to family and other forms of belonging — especially those that may reveal a tension between how we see ourselves and how we feel defined. She lives on Mount Desert Island in Maine.