Planet Art North Beach Studio

Cultural Sensibilities: Back from Daegu, Korea

2012-01-08T14:29:00.000-08:00

join me for a talk at Sev Shoon Arts Center, Ballard Art Works
2862 NW Market Street, Third Floor, Seattle 98107
Thursday, January 26, 2012
7pm
for information: 206.782.7455 or alicedubiel@planetart.us

National 5.18 Memorial to Democracy Gwangju

Traveling with members of the Oregon chapter of the Women's Caucus for Art, and members of IRIDA from Moscow, Russia, we were graciously hosted by colleagues in Daegu and Gwangju, Korea. Our work was exhibited in three Korean cities and we toured numerous cultural treasures, ancient and contemporary. I will share images in a talk, and have catalogues for perusal. Cultural Sensibilities has been the title of a series of exhibitions in Portland, Daegu and Moscow offering opportunities for cultural exchanges in friendship. Community artists from Korea and Russia are inspiring and share perspectives on our work environments, education and political contexts.

Twitter essay: working title #occupyWestlake

2011-11-17T23:42:00.001-08:00

Currently this is in draft state: will add photos and outline to differentiate between my "essay" and conversations. Not sure how to format yet, but will work on it.

Richard Neil of Seattle Police Guild on KUOW at 10 am today: total projective identification + agent for corporate retail in downtown.
Here's the link to Weekday KUOW interview with Richard Neil of Seattle Police Officers' Guild. He's on before Dow C. http://www.kuow.org/program.php?id=25083
Richard Neil has no problem with privatization of public space by corporate business in downtown, wants suburban shoppers not #occupyseattle
In Seattle, Pacific Place parking garage was built with HUD funds. inside garage with wiwaxia in front
Time to reclaim public space privatized by corporate businesses downtown. HUD parking at Pacific Place #occupyseattle Chase ATM RT by

kaskadia Kit R

RT @odaraia: Time 2 reclaim public space privatized .. downtown. HUD parking at Pacific Place #occupyseattle And just where are those suburbanites from, Seattle Police guild Richard Neil? at these prices... #occupyseattle price sign

@kaskadia Thanks for RT. This garage & re-open Pine are theft of public property as far as I'm concerned. Why important to occupy Westlake.

SeaRFez Stephen Fesler

@odaraia as a planner, I largely have to agree. Mainly because public spaces owned/maintained by businesses are exclusionary and fail to..

SeaRFez Stephen Fesler

@odaraia capture the interest of patrons. There are exceptions however, but there has to be a stong money motive and good to work inspite

SeaRFez Stephen Fesler

@odaraia *good design team to work inspite of status quo

@SeaRFez It's more fun and engaging to go to a real public space with real benches, people interacting. Why street food and real parks work.
This HUD parking garage at Pacific Place is nicely appointed for suburbanites to come downtown. Why #occupyseattle (elevator pic)
More fancy and expensive (lighting) appointments at HUD funded parking Pacific Place. #occupyseattle elevators
Footnote @Dktr_Sus @SeaRFez You might be interested in my installation essay at old 911 in 1993 varoregistry.org/dubiel/more4.h…

The clincher: the hoi polloi need not show up to HUD parking garage at Pacific Place. #occupyseattle valet parking and two range rovers
Conversation
tigerljily Ljiljana

@odaraia I heard that. B/c I thought it was Dow, I was completely shocked, but then I recalibrated

@tigerljily Dow was trivializing, I think, but he might have been embarrassed by Neil's artless support of bizness.
The complicity of city, county officials & police officers such as Richard Neil in privatization of public space is why #occupyWestlake

tigerljily Ljiljana

@odaraia and come on, it's not like these businesses are your neighbors' haberdashery, they're all soulless corporate junk sellers.

@tigerljily Yes, there's no Theo chocolates at Westlake; it's Warren Buffet's See's Candies!

@tigerljily +You must have seen new tv commercials from AMEX re small businesses: I think Amazon is defined as a "small bix 4 tax purposes."

The Landscape Tale from Agriculture: An Alchemical Treatise

2011-04-28T15:22:00.000-07:00

I believe that the Western landscape tradition effectively distances the viewer (who is characteristically middle and upper class) from the outdoors and other people.Works such as Virgil's evocation of country life in The Georgics or the landscape paintings of Poussin are the product of both rising imperialism and an urban society. The allure of "simple country life" and its cult of authenticity draws present-day middle class Americans to wilderness preservation as much as to suburbia. We can reclaim our cities and make them livable first by acknowledging our rage, our desire to escape the banality and oppression of our lives. By offering resources for installation viewers, I want to support efforts at dynamic urban solutions to the perceived agricultural crisis.

Mapping

2011-04-21T17:36:00.000-07:00

excerpts from statements about techniques I use and why:

[re: Views and Reviews, 1999]
think of my work over the past sixteen years as expressing a theme–Land Use: An Alchemical Treatise. Some of the works explore the connections between our belief systems about society and how we treat the planet, each other. Others examine the ways traditional cultural approaches–landscape painting and the concept of Arcadia–have contributed to contemporary land use practices. In works such as Views and Reviews, I like to explore the conflicts which arise from our expectations about land use, expectations shaped by idealized art and design images and our vernacular urban setting. Using the quotation essay, I want to think about different forms of resistance and resilience as strategies, sometimes alternating, to foster our lives and activities.
I have also created shrines for community based environmental activities: Flowing Salmon Shrine and Speculations. Artists in many cultures developed shrines to incorporate both artistic and ethical values, often to express the sacred quality of a particular site, such as a spring, a tree or one with historical significance. Shrines may be local or draw visitors from far and near. I like to think of some contemporary tourist destinations as shrines, offering visitors a share in their meaning: Mt. Rainier, the US Capitol, Graceland, the Oregon Trail, the Grand Canyon, and refer to this quality in Views and Reviews.

[from the Slave Trade was Free Trade 2001]
Currently I am working on acrylic and mixed media paintings, part of two shrine series, one about Frederick Douglass, the 19th century US orator, and the others about land use. In these works I am interested in exploring the intersections of human activity, ecosystems and geologic presence. In my painting and shrines, I am trying to develop a visual and symbolic language of seeds, sprouting forms, land shapes, fish and female figures to explore the contradiction of diversity and overlapping multiplicity within a culture whose dominant ideology expresses conflict in individualism and capitalism. Each painting is framed or scrolled as though it were a laboratory specimen box, reflecting the culture’s attempt to contain such truth and control it. In installations, some large works essentially become wallpaper and are not at all necessarily contained.

Commentary on "Speculations"

2011-04-21T14:32:00.000-07:00

Statement: Agriculture: An Alchemical Treatise is a large on-going conceptual work comprised of several approaches. Other parts of this work describe cultural strategies which mystify our relationship to the technologies of food production. The allure of simple country life” and its cult of authenticity is at lest as old (and as imperialistic) as Virgil. I believe we can reclaim our cities and make urban living sustainable first by acknowledging our rage, our desire to escape the banality and oppression of our lives. Next , by visualizing what home could be like, we plant the seeds of the work we want to do. For me, the seed is a powerful and fertile image for the process of becoming. The water in the “candle” jars is taken from my watershed.

Description of the installation
1994 mixed media, acrylic and ink on paper. The shrine consists of four stepped wooden boxes painted in black and a triptych ( domestic) hardwood frame containing hanging scrolls. the scrolls are Arches cover black. The center scroll, 5’ x 5’, contains an image of a livable city with stars falling into the ground, stars representing fertility. This is surrounded by two other scrolls containing rubber stamp images of ancient cultural and newly created symbols for seeds. Dimensions are 8'H x 13’ L x 5’ W. On the steps of the shrine are arranged bowls with green manure seeds, for building soil fertility and drainage. In front of the shrine are flats containing soil. Viewers are invited to write their wishes and commitments to a sustainable community on black tissue, and “plant” them with vetch seeds in the flats. Viewer participants are also invited to take with them seed packets for planting in the community. The seed flats were later transplanted into a community park. This is dedicated to the community of Seattle Tilth.

The following is the text of the scrolls:

The spirit of community is the breath of our hope. The blessings of rain, wind, warmth and soil are gifts--the finest materials for creation. We are grateful. Let us join together as we commit ourselves to our sacred work: harming none, caring for all.

“The earth sweats germinating power from its very pores.... the soul is the freshness of the flesh, for the body grows and thrives through it just as the earth becomes fruitful through moisture.” [The deity says] “I am the breeze that nurtures all things green. I encourage blossoms to flourish with ripening fruits. I am the rain coming from the dew that causes the grasses to laugh with to joy of life.”
Hildegard von Bingen [11th century abbess, Germany]

Reinhabitory Sketches:
“First Cuts toward Living in a Watershed Commons
“We must begin where we are, at our personal moment of perception. We seek a sense of self-in-place first of all, and a community on a human scale, evolving to a community of creatures.
“Access steps:
“Where do I live? guided initiations are offered to those who seek to know.
“What is my life work? What moves me?
“Access steps mean transformations-tourism to hospitality; urban renewal to landscape renewal;
“...The region’s unique resonance will continue to sound behind whatever celebrations are carried by it, and proclaim itself more clearly than any declarations made about it. Reinhabitants of the place, people who want to maintain a full life for themselves and for the watershed, are shaping human celebrations which respond to that resonance. Celebrations which depend on but can be shared by other species. Lives which can be part of the region proclaiming itself.”
--Frisco Bay Mussels Group

link to image and discussion

from Cairo on Twitpic; love sent back

2011-02-02T08:50:00.000-08:00

صورة لميدان التحرير في القاهرة قب... on Twitpic

This is one of the best pictures I've ever seen. Robin (my son) who had spent several weeks studying in Cairo spring 2009 is familiar with Tahrir and its history. Despite the suffering today, the past week's report of the amazing resistance of the people of Egypt should inspire us all. Let's keep pressuring the US government to support these people, not repression.

Protest at Amazon HQ today

2010-12-13T22:53:00.000-08:00

Couldn't post a sound file so I can tweet it. Instead of protest cheers, people blew whistles to protest Amazon's removal of Wikileaks site from their cloud servers.

In the studio on #101010 – artwork for North Cascades National Park

2010-10-11T18:37:00.000-07:00

Part of my work at North Cascades National Park during the residency involved presentations to local schools in Sedro Woolley, the library in Concrete and making a work for the Park's collection. I'm preparing this work to show at the open studio here at Planet Art on October 31 before delivering it to the Park. Here's how it looked yesterday while working on #101010, the global work party coordinated by 350.org along with a detail of a crackle paste study of trilobites. The maps were created digitally and printed on handmade paper using USGS topographical maps made by park staff in 1976. Here, you see washes I have laid on them, and I will continue to paint on top of them as well as on the crackle paste. As a result of weather effects such as landslides and vegetative growth, the landscape has changed since then. Now the underpainting and digital image reflect historic landscapes, and not the current one.

Planet Art Open Studio and Hallowe'en devotion making

2010-09-28T13:44:00.000-07:00

12-5pm

October 31, 2010
2811 NW 93rd Street
Seattle 98117
206.782.7455
http://www.planetart.us/

see new works, prints, paintings, catalogs
special prices on prints and small works
books and small works by other artists available
bring memorabilia of loved ones passed to create your own devotion
refreshments and treats

International Exhibition in Portland

2010-07-09T09:12:00.000-07:00

Join me and 83 other artists from 24 countries on August 5, 5-7pm at the Littman Gallery, Portland State University Building, 1825 Broadway for USA 2010: Her Presence in Colours IX, International Women Artists' Exhibition as part of week long events surrounding a conference of women artists.

The Oregon Women’s Caucus for Art (OWCA), a chapter of the National Women’s Caucus for Art, welcomes to Portland international visitors for the 9th biannual conference of the International Women’s Art Council (INWAC) based in Panang, Malaysia. This is the first such conference held in the United States and Portland will be opening its doors to welcome the artists during the first week in August. The public is invited to the week long series of free events, offering an opportunity to interact with the artists and to help promote world peace and harmony through communication and meaningful interaction.

Public Events:
Mon, Aug 2, 4 PM – MAYOR’S OFFICE WELCOMING RECEPTION
Location: Portland City Hall, 1221 SW 4th Ave

Tues, Aug 3, 10AM-4PM – INWAC International Artists’ Forum.
Artists from Asia, Europe, Australia, and Americas will give presentations, sharing their experience as artists.
Location: Ecotrust Building, Billy Frank, Jr. Conference Center. 721 NW Ninth Ave.

Thurs, Aug 5, 9AM-12noon – ARTIST TALKS
Location: Littman Gallery, PSU Smith Building, 1825 Broadway
1:30-4PM ARTISTS SEMINAR: Art Made Out of Desperate Need,
Location: PSU, Shattuck Hall Annex, 1914 SW Park Ave
5-7PM, EXHIBITION OPENING RECEPTION
Location: Littman Gallery, PSU Smith Building, 1825 Broadway
Note: Exhibition dates at Littman Gallery Aug 5-27, Gallery hours: Mon– Fri, 12-4PM

BACKGROUND INFORMATION:  In 2008, OWCA members Madeline Janovec and Una Kim were asked in Beijing at the 8th INWAC conference, where they were participants, to host the 9th conference in Portland. OWCA agreed to host this important event. Previous conferences have been held in Australia, England, Malaysia, China, Thailand, Korea. The conference is the vision of  Dr. Yuen Chee Ling, Director of the Conservancy of Fine Art of Malaysia and founder/president of the International Council of Women’s Art.
Her Presence in Colours reflects the cohesive spirit of women artists and their inner passion for life and art, their concern and awareness, their emotions and aspirations.

For more information: Contact: Co-Chair Karen Swallow, 503.231.7624, swallowtales@comcast.net
Co-Chair Una Kim, 503.358.8891 unakim1@yahoo.com

Crackle Paste notes

2010-05-22T15:07:00.000-07:00

Applied crackle paste to boards, both with immediate water spray and not: not really different. Main criteria for problem cracking is thickness (or thinness) of application.
Fix: pieces were falling out: poured mixture of 2/3 matte regular gel and 1/3 self leveling gel. Smoothed in with spatula palette knife, but ridges still show. Nice satin finish. Palette knife also seems to wipe edges of paint. (ran it over many times to reduce ridges). So be cautious about palette knife.
Try: soft gel matte instead of regular gel, and less wiping.
The thinner crackle paste doesn't require the coat for surface integrity and leaves surface for absorbent.
Trying to figure out whether to scrape the small door since paste was so thick. However, there are really cool little spot indentations perhaps from bubbles or water spray. Perhaps not entirely scraping. Need to get more board material.

Also, photoshopped fossil and collaged onto canvas.
used: film grain, glowing edges tweaked, then diffuse glow, tweaked
Looks very fern like. Paint over with iridescent/interference? Certainly around border, or extending the picture...
These could work really well for chine colle.

changes in Biocenosis exhibition dates NOT!

2010-04-21T09:09:00.000-07:00

After lengthy email correspondence, Phinney Center is keeping Biocenosis until April 29 at 5pm despite their scheduling conflict, preparing for their annual auction. I hope that you are able to see the show before this scheduled close. Exhibition information is still below.

Biocenosis: An exhibition at Phinney Center Gallery

2010-04-04T10:44:00.000-07:00

Exhibition on view April 8 through April 29, 2010

Phinney Center Gallery
Phinney Neighborhood Association
6532 Phinney Avenue North
Seattle WA 98103

reception April 9, 2010, 7-9 pm (part of Artwalk)
Gallery Hours

Monday through Friday 9am–9pm
Saturday 9am–2pm
206.783.2244

Biocenosis is the process or system of organisms and natural phenomena interacting within a particular environment. The works in this exhibition include paintings and prints from 1993 through 2006. Earlier ones, from the series, Re: Seeding Gaia, link the politics of industrial botany with women's reproductive rights. A few are from the series, Penelope's Web, referring to the Odyssey and caretaking for posterity. More recent works reflect on biocenology and our approaches to landscape representation. See the statement for the exhibition below.

Please see http://www.planetart.us/ for biography and curriculum vitae.

Here is the catalogue of works, grouped by series. Sales are handled by the Phinney Center Gallery and retail prices reflect accordingly. WA state sales tax will be added.

SERIES: TITLE OF WORK MEDIA DIMENSIONS (UNFRAMED) DATE PRICE

Crisis Management in Reproduction: Sustainable Post Germination acrylic on paper 30 x 44 inches 1993 2150
Crisis Management in Reproduction: Invasive Procedures acrylic on paper 30 x 44 inches 1993 2150
Penelope's Web: Skylla's Cliff acrylic on paper 15 x 22 inches 2000 725
Penelope's Web: A Great Wave acrylic on paper 15 x 22 inches 2000 725
Penelope's Web: Departing Skheria acrylic on paper 18 x 23 inches 2000 860
Re:seeding Gaia: Germination Impression puzzle piece collagraph 9 x 12 inches 1995 360
Re:seeding Gaia: Diversity Yields Stability multi-plate relief print 8.5 x 11 inches 1996 325
Re:seeding Gaia: Brown Earth acrylic on paper 22 x 30 1998 975
Re:seeding Gaia: (Flowing Consciousness) Enlightenment is a Social Responsibility acrylic on paper 22 x 30 inches 1998 975
Re:seeding Gaia: Creek Chum in Salt Water acrylic on paper 22 x 30 inches 1999 1290
Resistance/Resilience: Children of the Rivers acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper 60 x 85 cm 2002 1290
Resistance/Resilience: Mountain Mudflow acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper 60 x 85 cm 2002 1290
Resistance/Resilience: Fish resist acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper 60 x 85 cm 2002 1290
Resistance/Resilience: Imagination resists domination acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper 60 x 85 cm 2002 1290
Resistance/Resilience: Ross Lake Crows and Trout acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper 60 x 85 cm 2003 1290
Resistance/Resilience: Pumpkin Mountain/Diablo Dam Crows and Trout acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper 60 x 85 cm 2003 1290
Resistance/Resilience: Ross Lake: High Summer acrylic and mixed media, photocopy on paper 60 x 85 cm 2005 1290
Strategic Clearing: White Pass and Bumping Lake acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper, mounted on stretched canvas 60 x 85 cm ea 2000 3450
Strategic Clearing: Douglas Wilderness acrylic and photocopy on paper, mixed media 60 x 85 cm 2003 1290
Strategic Clearing: Mt. Rainier acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper, mounted on stretched canvas 60 x 85 cm ea 2004 2450
The Slave Trade Was Free Trade: A Tale of Money acrylic and mixed media on paper 60 x 85 cm 2000 1290
The Slave Trade Was Free Trade: Trade A Tale of Struggle acrylic and mixed media on paper 60 x 85 cm 2001 1290
The Transformation of the Landscape: Worm Flows collagraph and mixed media 28 x 19 cm 2001 290
The Transformation of the Landscape: Ape Cave collograph and mixed media 19 x 28 cm 2001 290
The Transformation of the Landscape: The Breach collagraph and mixed media 28 x 38 cm 2001 350
We Call It Columbia: Iyagathl Imathl Bridal Veil, Bonneville Dam, Hood River acrylic, photocopy on paper, mounted on stretched canvas 60 x 85 cm ea [triptych] 2000 3225

Pecha Kucha Seattle Slide List

2010-02-18T12:29:00.000-08:00

The Hazel Tree Mother: The Tree in Winter, 2007, acrylic and digital collage, Alice Dubiel
Lay Women Healers in Medieval Europe, mural for Student Health Center, San Jose State University, 1979, acrylic media, Alice Dubiel
Apocalyptic Visions: Scrolls for a Fearful Time: We feared the slow death of fish and marine life from the poisoning of the planet, Scroll II, watercolor on paper, wood, silk, 1984, Alice Dubiel
Rhinewater Purification Plant, installation, 1972 Museum Haus Lange, Krefeld, Germany, Hans Haacke
Dreaming the Earth Whole: Watershrine, 1990, Bumbershoot Seattle, mixed media installation, Alice Dubiel; for complete installation, collaborators Marita Dingus, Ann T. Rosenthal, Sarah Teofanov
Flowing Salmon Shrine, 1997, mixed media, (Carkeek Park and other locations) Alice Dubiel
Agriculture and Reproductive Freedom: A Tale of Crisis Management, 1992-1997 (2 images), Alice Dubiel
Re:Seeding Gaia: Flow, 1996, acrylic on paper, wood, Alice Dubiel
Penelope’s Web: The Light Bursts Forth, 1999, acrylic and mixed media on paper, Alice Dubiel
The Landscape Tale, from Agriculture: An Alchemical Treatise, 1993-4, installation at 911 media arts, Seattle
The Landscape Tale, exhibition announcement, 1993, commercially printed art card of image by Karl Friedrich Schinkel, 1809, and letterpress of map of Paris c. 18th C. superimposed, Alice Dubiel
Strategic Clearing: Mt. Rainier, 2004, acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper, mounted on stretched canvas, Alice Dubiel
Strategic Clearing: White Pass and Bumping Lake, 2000, acrylic, photocopy and mixed media on paper, mounted on stretched canvas, Alice Dubiel
North Cascades Lichen Leaves, 2006, digital print and relief paint, Alice Dubiel
Mt. Stephen, 2009, photo by Alice Dubiel or Jim Hopfenbeck
Walcott 2009, conference reception at Whyte Museum, Banff, Alberta, photo by Alice Dubiel
Opabinia regalis, specimen prepared by Charles Doolittle Walcott, described by Harry Whittington, photos by Chip Clark, and Opabinia action figure, courtesy Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto
Sculpin egg mass, Summer 2009, Golden Gardens Park Beach, photo by Alice Dubiel
A New Song in Praise of Peace, 2009, acrylic and mixed media on board, Alice Dubiel (also cover to Laude Novella, compact disk recording by Medieval Women’s Choir)

Also included Seed Card piece, Imagination Resists Domination: Crimson Clover, 1994-2003. This was a revision of seed packets pieces accompanying shrines and other installations.
Here's the text:
Imagination resists domination
Crimson clover
Plant in urbanized areas to colonize increased plant space, roots break the subsurface. Green manures fertilize and cultivate soils. Plant the seeds of your dreams in the dark of your imagination. As you sow, visualize a city which nourishes without depletion, where fertility is wealth. Hold the soil in your hand. Make your wish come true.
© 1994-2003 Alice Dubiel
http://www.planetart.us/
for The Landscape Tale: http://www.varoregistry.org/dubiel/more4.html
for Crisis Management: http://www.varoregistry.org/dubiel/more3.html

Slide List for Social Injustice, The Gallery at Tacoma Community College

2010-02-17T15:20:00.000-08:00

Diego Rivera
Mujeres Muralistas
Alice Dubiel, Lay Women Healers in Medieval Europe
John Heartfield
Hannah Hoch
Deborah Lawrence
Judy Chicago
Miriam Schapiro
Joyce Kozloff
Alice Dubiel, Crisis Management in Reproduction: Women and Agriculture

The Slave Trade Was Free Trade

2010-01-28T22:02:00.000-08:00

A Statement

I believe that visual traditions and themes create a kind of language that exerts a powerful effect on social consciousness. I am interested in the Western landscape tradition, especially in its ability to distance the viewer from the outdoors and other people.

When exploring themes with ecological content, searching for different visual languages for landscape, I have been inspired by many traditions including contemporary pattern and decoration strategies, Roman and Byzantine mosaics, Japanese decorative art, indigenous Australian paintings and the shrine technologies of many cultures. The term biocenology is useful because it is the study of communities and member interactions in nature.

These acrylic and mixed media paintings in the series, The Slave Trade was Free Trade, incorporate the words of Frederick Douglass, the 19th century US orator. Inspired by the writings of historian Robin Blackburn, The Overthrow of Colonial Slavery and The Making of New World Slavery, I was interested in identifying the intersections of human activity, economics and culture, ecosystems and geologic presence. I am trying to develop a visual and symbolic language to express the contradiction of diversity and overlapping multiplicity within a culture whose dominant ideology expresses conflict in individualism and capitalism. Paintings are framed as if laboratory specimens, reflecting the culture’s attempt to contain such truth and control it.
January 2002

Approaching Biocenology: Meditations on the Wild and the Sacred

2009-04-27T16:18:00.000-07:00

A Statement

We have some technologies for aiding our quest toward consciousness, toward life-death-life cycle affirmation. These are the technologies of symbol making, experiencing community as spirit, infusing wildness with cultivation, blending the natural and the cultural with conscience. These technologies make each of us everyday artists.

I like to explore different landscape representations to express my personal experiences and cultural interactions with geography. I am interested in the conflicts which arise from our expectations about land use, expectations shaped by idealized art and design images and our vernacular urban setting. By employing the approach of pattern and decoration, I would like to create a different language referring to many traditions including maps, Roman and Byzantine mosaics, Japanese decorative art, textile design, indigenous Australian paintings and shrine technologies of many cultures. I like to use the term biocenology in this interface of cultural and natural systems because it is the study of communities and member interactions in nature; it is an exploration of systems, part of the science of ecology.

Much of my work over the past twenty years expresses the theme–Land Use: An Alchemical Treatise to explore the connections between our belief systems about society and how we treat the planet, each other.

Currently I work with acrylic, encaustic, mixed media and printmaking approaches. Some paintings feature topographic maps which I photocopy onto handmade paper. Others incorporate images or formal structures. Upon this layer, I lay acrylic or encaustic washes; sometimes more than one to build luminosity and relate to the landscape. Then I add stamped images of animals such as fish, birds and eggs and seeds, using brilliantly colored and iridescent pigments derived from mica. With these techniques, I am trying to express the complexity of overlapping multiplicity and the tendency of natural processes to pursue cycles of life.

In its relentless desire for control, the Western landscape tradition distances the viewer from the outdoors and people. Visual traditions and themes create a kind of language that exerts a powerful effect on social consciousness. Artists choose particular traditions and themes to explore and alter these ranges of expression. I want to create new narratives that reaffirm our ties to where we live, the planet, nature and its cycles.

Alice Dubiel January 2009

Penelope’s Web

2009-04-26T10:08:00.000-07:00

A Statement

From The Odyssey by Homer, translated by Robert Fitzgerald, Book 5, ll. 315-35

A great wave drove at him with toppling crest
spinning him round, in one tremendous blow,
and he went plunging overboard, the oar-haft
wrenched from his grip. A gust that came on howling
at the same instant broke his mast in two,
hurling his yard and sail far out to leeward.
Now the big wave a long time kept him under,
helpless to surface, held by tons of water,
tangled, too, by the seacloak of Kalypso.
Long, long, until he came up spouting brine,
with streamlets gushing from his head and beard;
but still bethought him, half-drowned as he was,
to flounder for the boat and get a handhold into the bilge--to crouch there, foiling death.
Across the foaming water, to and fro,
the boat careered like a ball of tumbleweed
blown on autumn plains, but intact still.
So the winds drove this wreck over the deep,
East Wind and North Wind, then South Wind and West,
coursing each in turn to the brutal harry.

Penelope was the wife of the ancient Greek warrior, Odysseus, who fought ten years in the Trojan War and journeyed for ten more years before returning home. Penelope waited for Odysseus’s return: during this wait, her son grew to maturity; her mother-in-law, with whom she lived, died of grief, suiciding; and many suitors courted Ithaca’s queen. Her father-in-law retired to the hills, living among the herders: she, alone, managed the household. As was the custom, the suitors came to her home, exploiting her hospitality, screwing her servants, insulting her son, insisting Odysseus was dead and would never return. She developed a stratagem to delay them against his return: every day she wove the shroud for her father-in-law’s eventual burial, and each night she unraveled nearly all the day’s work. For years, she kept the suitors away until they found out about the unraveling from a servant. They confronted her, and still she declined their posturing, seeking the goddess’s protection until Odysseus, in disguise, drew near.

Penelope’s power is self-contained and not contingent upon Odysseus’s presence.
The series, Penelope’s web, is about power: the power of personal integrity amid the complexity of domesticity. The web is a symbol of protection. It is about connections to the dead and the living, about hope’s secret struggle against despair. It is about connections and threads, which may unravel but remain connected to the true heart. It is about sending messages across the wine-dark sea, never knowing whether they will be heard. It is about protecting oneself, one’s household in the face of insults, adversity, transgression and abandonment.

Penelope’s web of protection can be a metaphor to explore our stewardship of the planet. We cannot neglect our duty, especially to our urban environment; we can use our creative skills to devise new strategies to protect our earth household, neither to exploit nor abandon it. Nor can we await someone else to complete it. Rather, we are the caretakers whose struggle retains the inheritance for posterity and dignity for the honored guest.

Alice Dubiel October 1999

From The Women’s Dictionary of Myth and Symbols by Barbara Walker

“Penelope’s web is an interesting pattern of ten small pentacles ranged around a central wheel of ten spokes. All the pentacles together are composed of only two lines, as can be seen by following their interlaced patterns with the eye. This is a sign of protection like the simple pentacle, made even more suggestively defensive by the ring of twenty outward facing points, and the lines of connection drawing all sections together in the center, as a unifying cause or concept draws people together for the preservation of all.

“The mythological figure of Penelope is especially associated with preservation and protection because it was she, with her constant refusal to cut the thread of like, who preserved the life of her husband Odysseus through his many adventures, even after a death curse had been laid on him by the Trojan Queen and High Priestess of Hecate. Penelope, whose name means ‘veiled one,’ was really a title of the Fate-goddess who could determine men’s destinies by the treatment of her woven threads. When she cut, the man would die. According to Homer, Penelope unwove her web each night rather than cut the thread that represented Odysseus; and so he escaped all dangers and eventually returned to his home.”

Curriculum Vitae

2009-04-25T20:23:00.000-07:00

EDUCATION
M.A. Art (painting), San Jose State University, San Jose, CA, August 1982.
A.B. English literature, University of California, Santa Cruz, June 1972.
University of California, Irvine, 1987-1989. Graduate study in English literature, critical theory emphasis.
California State University, Long Beach, 1986. Graduate study in English Literature, ESL.
Bryn Mawr College, 1973. Graduate study in English literature.
The Woman’s Building (Los Angeles), 1981. Feminist studio workshop, letterpress and feminist theory.

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2008 The Hazel Tree Mother, Sev Shoon Arts Center/Ballard Works, Seattle WA
2007 Planet Art: The Realm of Imagination and Everyday Artists, Janovec Studio Gallery, Portland OR
2004 Resilient Topography, Bon Macy’s Gallery, Seattle
2003 The Topography of Resistance, Gallery One, Ellensberg WA
Land Use: Maps of Least Resistance, Pioneer Square Healing Arts Gallery, Seattle
2002 Salmon Resistance/Resilience, Auburn City Hall Gallery, Auburn WA
2001 Contested Terrain, Pioneer Square Healing Arts Gallery, Seattle
2000 The Biocenological Net: An Alchemical Treatise, Ohlone College, Fremont, California
–––– Penelope’s Web and other Tales of Gaia, University Unitarian Church, Seattle
1993-4 The Landscape Tale, 911 media arts center, Seattle
1988 Apocalyptic Visions: Scrolls Surviving a Fearful Age, Ohlone College, Fremont, California
1987 Apocalyptic Visions, University of Wisconsin, Marshfield
1985 A Journey Within-An Environmental Codex Installation, Intersection Gallery, San Francisco, California
1981 A Journey Within, Art Department, SJSU (master’s)
1979 Demythifying the Creative Process, Art Department, SJSU
Mural Studies and process, President’s Office, SJSU

COMMUNITY INSTALLATIONS & PROJECTS
2007 Syndicalism: The Art of Tend & Befriend, curating exhibition, Washington State Convention and Trade Center, Seattle WA
2004 City of Ladies and Pleyn Delite, installation/performance with Medieval Women’s Choir, Seattle
2002 Flowing Salmon Shrine, installation, Piper’s Creek Watershed Celebration, Carkeek Park, Seattle
2001 Approaching Biocenology: Meditations on the Wild, installation, White Sturgeon Gallery, City of Vancouver Water Resources Education Center, Vancouver, WA
1999 Re: Seeding Gaia--Paintings in Flow, City of Vancouver Water Resource Education Center, Vancouver
1997 Flowing Salmon Shrine, Piper’s Creek, Carkeek Park, Seattle
Watershrine: We all live in the Watershed, installation, Edmonds Community College, Edmonds, Washington
1996 Watershrine..., installation, Arbor Day & Resource Fair, Carkeek Park
1994 Endangered Species, Metro bus shed in collaboration with students from Lake Forest Park School, Lake Forest Park, Washington
Speculations: Urban Sustenance from Agriculture: An Alchemical Treatise, for the Seattle Tilth Symposium, “Sustaining the City,” Seattle Central Community College
Watershrine..., Salmon Homecoming, Seattle Aquarium
1991 Whispers in the Dark in “Illuminations,” Museum of History and Industry, Seattle

COMMISSIONED WORKS & AWARDS
4Culture Special Projects Award, King County, Washington, 2007
Artist-in-residence, North Cascades National Park, Washington, 2006
Kathe Kollwitz Award, Northwest Women’s Caucus for Art, 2001
Finalist, Salmon in the City, Seattle, 2000
Public funds, METRO, Seattle, 1994.
Public and private funds, Museum of History and Industry, 1991.
Public and corporate funding, Bumbershoot, 1990.
NEH funding for research in art history, 1985-87.
Private Commissions 1982-85, Los Angeles.
Mural: Lay Women Healers in Medieval Europe, SJSU Student Health Center 1979
Mural for the Nursing Faculty, SJSU, 1980
Kathryn Ull Carr Scholarship, SJSU, 1979, 1980, 1981

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
[forthcoming August, 2010] “Her Presence in Colours XI,” Littman Gallery, Portland State University, Portland, OR
2009 “Korean and American Women Artists: Cultural Sensibilities IV,” Littman Gallery, Portland State University
“Feminist Art Exhibition,” Tacoma Community College, Tacoma WA
2008 “Feminist Ecology: Women and the Earth,” Koehnline Museum of Art, Oakton Community College, Des Plaines, IL
“Above and Below,” University House, Seattle, curator Charlotte Beall
“Seattle Print Artists,” University House, Issaquah , curator Charlotte Beall
2007 “Tribute to Tee A. Corinne,” Janovec Studio/Gallery, Portland
2006 “Through Women’s Eyes,” New Kyungbook Art Museum, Kyungbook University, Daegu, Korea
“Going to Daegu Korea,” Janovec Studio/Gallery, Portland
“Paper Politics,” 5+5 Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
2005 “Paper Politics,” Phinney Neighborhood Center, Seattle WA
2003 “Home-Land” Port Angeles Fine Arts Center, Port Angeles WA
2002 “One Year Later: Artists Respond to World Events,” Hunter Art Gallery, Seattle Central Community College, Seattle
2002 “Natural Processes,” Dorothy O’Brien Cancer Lifeline Center, Seattle
2001 Sev Shoon Arts Center, (Ballard) Seattle
Seattle Art Museum Rental/Sales Gallery, Seattle
1998-9 “The View from Here: One Hundred Artists on the Centennial of Mt. Rainier National Park,” Seafirst Gallery, Yakima Valley Museum, Museum of Northwest Art, Mt. Fuji, Japan
1996 “From Here to There,” Bumbershoot Arts Festival, Seattle
1995 “Agents of Change: New Views by Northwest Women,” Washington State Convention and Trade Center, Seattle
1993 “Con-texts: Identities and Environments,” OK Hotel, Seattle
“Flyways,” traveling exhibition, Cunningham Gallery, University of Washington; Monterey; Hawaii
1991-3 “cross currents”, traveling exhibition, Selby Gallery, Ringling School of Art and Design, Sarasota, Florida; Oregon School of Arts and Crafts; University Art Gallery, California State U, Hayward
1991 “Collaborators,” Tacoma Art Museum, Tacoma, Washington
1990 “Pacific Rim Bookworks,” University of California, Santa Barbara
“Dreaming the Earth Whole,” collaborative installation, Bumbershoot Arts Festival, Seattle Center
1989 “A Book in Hand,” Arvada Center for the Arts, Arvada, Colorado
1987 “Reflections on Survival,” The Woman’s Building, Los Angeles
“Bookworks: Art From the Page,” Salem Art Center, Salem, Oregon
“Undercover: Women’s Books” (Passages: Survey of Women Artists 1945-present), Fresno Arts Museum, Fresno, California
1986 “Experimental Books,” Works, San Jose
1985 “Imagine There’s a Future,” Thinking Eye Gallery, Los Angeles
“Nuclear Free Zone,” Massachusetts State House, Boston
“Many Voices/Many Visions,” Brand Library Art Galleries, Glendale, California
1984 “Personal Visions,” SOMAR Center Gallery, San Francisco
“Artists Look at US Politics in the 1980’s,” Southwestern College, Chula Vista, California
“From History to Action,” Woman’s Building, Los Angeles
1983 “Target L.A.,” Pasadena, CA
1982 “Other Species,” Gallery 1:16, Los Angeles
1981 “Our Connecting Link,” Works, San Jose

PUBLICATIONS
[forthcoming] Cover art to illustrate compact disc recording, Laude Novella, Medieval Women’s Choir, 2009.
Cover art to illustrate compact disc recording, O Rubor Sanguinis, Medieval Women’s Choir, 2006.
Art [about the artist’s work]
Ressler, Susan,Women Artists of the American West, McFarland Press, 2003.
Ressler, Susan, “Activist Practice,” It’s All About the Apple, or is it? Text for Women Artists of the American West and , 1999.
“Implode the Dome: A Modest Speculation” in Art Papers (Atlanta Georgia), May/June 1997, volume 21, number 3.
Art History [written by the artist]
Women Artists in the United States: a selective research and resource guide on the fine and decorative arts, 1750-1986, edited by Paula Chiarmonte, Boston: G.K. Hall, 1990. I researched the history of women’s performance in the US.
The Amazing Decade: Women’s Performance Art in America, 1970-1980, edited by Moira Roth, Los Angeles: Astro Artz, 1983. I contributed to the chronology and the bibliography.

LECTURES DELIVERED
"Patterning and Biocenology: A residency in North Cascades National Park," SevShoon/Ballard Artworks, Seattle, WA , 2008
“Feeding Trees: Working in the Envrionmentalist and Social Activist Traditions,” Janovec Gallery, Portland, OR 2007
“The Relevance of Art to Diversity: An Artist’s Approach to Rethinking History” and mural rededication, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA 2007
“Working in the Environmentalist Tradition,” Sedro Woolley, Concrete, Washington, 2006
“Patterning and Biocenology: Situating My Work in the Tradition of Environmentalist Visual Art, University of Washington, Tacoma, 2005
“The City of Ladies,” Medieval Women’s Choir, Seattle WA, 2002
Northwest WCA, Seattle, WA, 2001
Smith Art Center Ohlone College, Fremont, CA, 2000 (videotaped)
WCA National Conference, Seattle, 1993 (Panel moderator)
Women Painters of Washington, Mercer Island, WA, 1991
SWCA and NW Women’s Studies Ass’n. Conference, Pullman WA, 1991 (panel)
Department of Sociology, University of California, Irvine, 1988, 1989
Ohlone College, Fremont, CA, 1988
Art Department University of Wisconsin, Marshfield, 1987
Cabrillo College, Aptos, CA, 1981
Department of Social Sciences, Womyn’s Week, SJSU, 1981
Woman’s Building, LA, 1981

COLLECTIONS
North Cascades National Park, Washington
Feminist Women's Health Center, Renton, Washington
Lou Harrison Collection, Aptos, California
Swedish Medical Center, Seattle, Washington
Student Health Center, San Jose State University, San Jose
University of Washington Medical Center Art Collection, Seattle
Women’s Museum of Art, Washington, DC
private collections

PROFESSIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
College Art Association 1981-present
Women’s Caucus for Art 1980-present (chapter president, Seattle WCA, 1995-6)
Seattle Print Arts 2001-present
Washington State Arts Alliance 1999-present
California Confederation of the Arts 1981-1987
Art Associations of the South Bay 1980-81; Non-Profit Gallery Association (N. California) 1980-81

POSITIONS HELD
Instructor, Art, Feminist Theory and Criticism, Art History, Women’s Art History, Computer-Aided Design, several Washington and California locations, 1982-96
Instructor, English, Art History, Seattle Central Community College, 1999
Instructor, English, Shoreline Community College, 1999
Instructor, English, University of California Irvine, 1987-1989
Instructor, Art History, Santa Monica College, 1983-4
Instructor, English, Santa Monica College, 1982-1987
Gallery Coordinator, Curator, Instructor, El Camino College, Torrance, California, 1981-2
Gallery Coordinator, Preparator, Montalvo Center for the Arts, 1979-1981
Preparator and Interpretor, Sempervirens Fund, Big Basin State Park, 1980
Conference Coordinator, Women’s Center San Jose State University, 1979-1980
Graphics & Publicity Consultant, University Services Agency, Santa Cruz, California
Pastry and cake maker, Staff of Life Bakery, Santa Cruz
Parent of (currently) 20 year old person

REVIEWS
Alice Dubiel directly commented on “wilderness” designation itself as a mask for our destruction of the earth. Her Views and Reviews: A Wilderness Tale exposed the exploitation of nature with pithy quotes and kitsch images.
-Susan Platt, Art Papers, May-June 1999
There’s a new look at the old in Alice Dubiel’s complex and poetic piece Views and Reviews: A Wilderness Tale,... [which] alludes to the conflict between civilization and nature.
-Ron Glowen, The Herald [Everett WA], January 8, 1999
Alice Dubiel is clever: in her installation at 911 Media Arts, she wrapped what was really a polemic in engaging dress. Her five window panels, like so many holiday window displays, drew in curious passers-by.... Dubiel used the panels to present visually her thesis that our view of the landscape, and of nature, is inevitably colored by the same desires for control and order that drive our relationship with the urban realm.
-Christopher Hawthorne, Seattle Weekly, January 26, 1994
Alice Dubiel addresses the issue of nuclear threat and environmental toxicity with a series of exquisite watercolors that combine the fluid delicacy of Persian miniatures with the format of medieval illuminations.
—Claire Accomando, Artweek, November 3, 1984
Alice Dubiel, using the scroll format of traditional Eastern painting in Apocalyptic Visions, connects the “ancient burning terror” of volcanic eruption to nuclear holocaust.
—Judith Margolis, Artweek, January 9, 1988.
A positive historical note is sounded by Alice Dubiel’s painting, Lay Women Healers in Medieval Europe, which calls to mind the fact that women have also been able to heal and have often been sisters to one another.
—Louise Moore, Artweek, June 9, 1984

O Rubor Sanguinis A Statement

2009-04-24T15:28:00.000-07:00

O rubor sanguinis
antiphon to St. Ursula
O rubor sanguinis,
qui de excelso illo fluxisti,
quo Divinitas tetigit,
tu flos es,
quem hiems de flatu serpentis numquam laesit.
Hildegard von Bingen

This series of paintings came about through experiment with coloring the backgrounds of the seed series. However, the formal element of the red opaque matte pigment revealed a not completely conscious interpretation very much related to profound changes in my physical and emotional cycles.

As a member of a women’s choir dedicated to performing medieval repetoire, I am constantly learning works by Hildegard von Bingen. One of the recurring images in her work is “O Rubor Sanguinis” the river of blood. This river sometimes appears as the blood flowing from Christ’s death wound, and sometimes as the Rhine in homage to the martyrdom of St. Ursula and her companions, the 11,000 virgins whose blood flowed in the river. Moreover, for Hildegard, moisture and high contrast melody are metaphors for life, for salvation. It is difficult for me to separate the power of these images as the result of religious vision from the fact that Hildegard’s visions began during her forties, when many of us physically experience rivers of blood. At a time when my reproductive system altered my capacity for procreation, I became very much aware of the multiplicity of possible children, possible lives which would not mature. Since we have our ovae from birth, which cycle each month during menses, which are left? Amazed at the variety and potentiality, I am grateful for the one who has matured and the environment which has nurtured him.

Alice Dubiel October 1999

In 2006 O Rubor Sanguinis: Tu Flos Es became the cover image for River of Red, the first compact disk recording of the Medieval Women’s Choir.

Alice Dubiel January 2009

this work is currently exhibited at the LIttman Gallery, Portland State University, Portland, Oregon

frustration

2009-04-24T15:26:00.000-07:00

starting this because my on-line gallery seems to have gone belly up with the coordinator's approaching wedding. Hope I can get the layout htmls for all the Landscape Tale.