Collaborative Rural Art Expo - May 25 - June 6, 2011

The Baseline Group Welcomes Lucy Lippard

Lucy Lippard: People and Place: Why Ecology Matters

Thursday, January 20, 2011

7:30 PM

University of Colorado Visual Arts Complex,

Auditorium 1B20 (lower level).

Free and open to the public.

Please join us in welcoming internationally known author, arts curator, culture critic and activist Lucy Lippard to the Visual Arts Complex on January 20^th at 7:30 PM. Ms. Lippard will speak on “People and Place: Why Ecology Matters.” Her presentation is sponsored by CU’s Art and Art History Department, The Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice Center’s Rocky Flats Nuclear Guardianship project, and The Baseline Group, an initiative within the Department of Art and Art History that focuses on community and site-based art practices. The lecture will take place at the University of Colorado’s Visual Arts Complex, Room 1B20 (lower level). There is no charge for admission; the public is invited.

Lucy R. Lippard is a writer/curator/editor/lecturer/activist, author of 21 books on contemporary art and cultural criticism, most recently Down Country: The Tano of the Galisteo Basin, 1250-1782 (Museum of New Mexico Press, 2010), The Lure of the Local: Senses of Place in a Multicentered Society, and On the Beaten Track: Tourism, Art, and Place (The New Press, 1997, 1999). She is a recipient of seven honorary degrees, a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Lannan Grant among other awards. Her most recent curatorial venture was Weather Report: Art and Climate Change (Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, 2007). She lives in rural Galisteo, New Mexico where she is on the County Traditional Community Planning Committee and for 14 years has edited the monthly community newsletter: El Puente de Galisteo.

This lecture is part of a larger series being organized by The Rocky Flats Nuclear Guardianship project which is co-sponsored by Naropa University's
Environmental Studies program and the Alandi Ashram of Boulder. This community-based initiative consists of a six-month series of sixteen presentations and workshops. For more detail about the entire project, including a calendar of events and bios of presenters, visit www.rockyflatsnuclearguardianship.org/

Onward to Yuma!

BASELINE GROUP at BMoCA

Dates: September 25-January 17

The BASELINE GROUP is a special topics course at CU-Boulder that engages fine art students-both graduate and undergraduate-in the processes of designing and implementing tangible large-scale projects. This class encourages students to develop work that is community-based, site-specific, and to incorporate non-traditional media and ideas. This first installation, titled the "Chicken Shack Village" explores rural aesthetics, farming, and "intuitive building." The project was created through 2-semesters of experiential activities and hands-on workshops that involved visiting artists Haiko Meijer from the Dutch design team Onix, and Marjetica Potrc, an award-winning artist from Ljubljana, Slovenia.

Words on Collaboration

I came across this article by Claire Bishop discussing collaborative art practices.  Here is an excerpt....

"Artists are increasingly judged by their working process — the degree to which they supply good or bad models of collaboration," she writes. "Accusations of mastery and egocentrism are leveled at artists who work with participants to realize a project instead of allowing it to emerge through consensual collaboration."

“There can be no failed, unsuccessful, unresolved, or boring works of collaborative art because all are equally essential to the task of strengthening the social bond," she continues. "While I am broadly sympathetic to that ambition, I would argue that it is also crucial to discuss, analyze, and compare such work critically as art.”

LINK

The BASELINE GROUP welcomes Marjetica Potrč Sept. 17 - 27, 2009!

Marjetica Potrč is an artist and architect based in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Her interdisciplinary practice includes on-site projects, research, architectural case studies, and series of drawings. Her work documents and interprets contemporary architectural practices (in particular, with regard to energy infrastructure and water use) and the ways people live together.

http://www.potrc.org/

http://www.maxprotetch.com

SUGGESTED READING

Community and Site-Based Practice: Recommended Reading

New Land Marks by Penny Balkin

Dialogues in Public Art by Tom Finkelpearl

Overlook: Exploring the Internal Fringes of America With the Center for Land Use Interpretation by Ralph Rugoff, Matthew Coolidge

The Lure of the Local: Senses of Place in a Multicentered Society by Lucy R. Lippard

CRITICAL ISSUES IN PUBLIC ART  by SENIE HF

Plop: Recent Projects of the Public Art Fund by Jeffrey Kastner

Public Art Since 1950 (Shire Album S.) by Lynn F. Pearson

Mapping the Terrain: New Genre Public Art by Suzanne Lacy

The Ideal City: 2nd Valencia Biennial  by Luigi Settembrini

Monuments for the USA  by Ralph Rugoff

Dan Graham (Contemporary Artists)  by Birgit Pelzer

 Taking Measures Across the American Landscape  by James Corner

 Rooted in the Land : Essays on Community and Place  by William Vitek

 Public Art By The Book  by Barbara Goldstein

 Surface Tension: Problematics of Site  by Ken Ehrlich

 Richard Long: Walking the Line  by Paul Moorhouse

 Marjetica Potrc: Urgent Architecture  by Marjetica Potrc

 Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space, trans. Maria Jolas, Boston, MA. Beacon Press, 1969.

W.J.T. Mitchell Art and the Public Sphere MIT Press 1993.

Black Dog Locus Solus, Site, Identity and Technology in Contemporary Art, Black Dog Publishing Ltd 1999.

Suzi Gablik Conversations before the end of Time, Thames & Hudson 1995.

Object to Be Destroyed: The Work of Gordon Matta-Clark by Pamela Lee

The Order of Things, An Archaeology of the Human Science by M.Foucault

An Introductory Guide to Post-Structuralism and Postmodernism by Madan Sarup

Space, Site, Intervention by E. Suderburg

From Studio to Situation by C. Doherty

The subversive Imagination by C. Becker

One place after another by M. Kwon

But is it art? by N. Felshin

The Citizen Artist by L. Burnham

summer summer summer time

Hello Everyone

Hope your summers went well. These are some images of CVS over the summer.  Stay tuned for updates coming soon.

Summer at BASELINE

Congratulations to everyone on a successful first semester of The BASELINE GROUP!  As we prepare for our first exhibition at The Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art in the Fall, I wanted to post a few important concepts and words of wisdom as you all continue your projects over the summer. 

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One of the most important things we learned from our collaboration with Haiko Meijer was to continually ask ourselves What can we do with the materials that are at hand?  Continue to ask yourself this question as you evolve your projects over the summer.

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"The project has taught me that the collective is more important than the individual, and without consideration for other group members no collaboration succeeds."  Anonymous Statement from our Class Reflections

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"Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision; the ability to direct individual accomplishment toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results.” 

“Strength is derived from unity.  The range of our collective vision is far greater when individual insights become one.”

– Andrew Carnegie

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Everyone is a leader.

Growth happens. Whenever it does, allow it to emerge. Learn to follow when it makes sense. Let anyone lead.

Collaborate.The space between people working together is filled with conflict, friction, strife, exhilaration, delight, and vast creative potential.
Listen carefully.Every collaborator who enters our orbit brings with him or her a world more strange and complex than any we could ever hope to imagine. By listening to the details and the subtlety of their needs, desires, or ambitions, we fold their world onto our own. Neither party will ever be the same.From Bruce Mau's Incomplete Manifesto

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Twelve Guidelines to remember as you update the ChickenShack Village:

1. Easy to clean.

2. Good drainage.

3. Protects the flock from wind and sun.

4. Keeps out rodents, wild birds, and other predatory animals.

5. Provides adequate space.

6. Ventilated.

7. Free of drafts.

8. Maintains a uniform temperature.

9. Place for roosting.

10. Place for hens to lay indoors.

11. Offers plenty of light.

12. Sanitary feed and water stations.

From Building Chicken Coops by Gail Damerow

Coop Work on Saturday

As Ryan said, anyone who wants to build on Saturday is welcome. The work starts at 10. Who wants to go get breakfast before then?

Tour de Coop in Ft. Collins

http://www.sustainablelivingassociation.org/tour-de-coop.php

Tour Postponed due to weather. 

It will be rescheduled for another Saturday in the next 4 weeks.

Re-design list of tasks

Pallet Shack
• Chicken-wire the bottom
• Secure the doors
• Nesting box door entrance, creation of nesting boxes
• Lateral Support (against wind, make secure to ground)
• Staining/Sealing of wood
• Enclosed run/Fenced-in Run

Mining Shack
• Re-size to fit into BMoCA
• Change/remove gray box on top?
• Integration of run—underneath possibly?
• Secure against predators
• Making it more accessible for the owners to clean and remove boxes

False Front
• Create Nesting Boxes
• Create roosting area
• Integration of Run?
• Window installation
• Screen door behind main door
• Pitch the roof and secure it
• Add top to the front
• Make sure it is secure
• Make a new false front, the original broke in the take down process

recent Denver Post story

http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_11921746

Thoughts from last week

Thoughts for BMoCA space

• Do shacks all need to be connected to one major run? Can there be multiple small runs? Seems a bit overwhelming when all is tied into one space
• Should there be a specific “children’s area” spot in the sculpture area? Or is this taking the project out of the realm of sculpture and making it into something other than what we want?
• Can eggs be sold from our chickens at the farmer’s market? Perhaps with a particular stamp on them? Perhaps a display outside encourages people to walk inside.
• Architecture kit—maybe sold at Design within Reach and the Farmer’s Market
• Omelette bar???? Don’t know. Sounds messy
• Two brochures—or perhaps double sided brochure—one that tells about the artistic context, one that talks about getting hens into back yards
• Chickens there every Saturday, but only accessible by viewing. No human/chicken interaction. (Disease, harm to the chickens…)
• Live feed from interior of chicken shacks—“chicken cam” so you can check what is going on inside.
• Floor protection for BMoCA?? Straw maybe not enough.
• Video from Marcy maybe not in same space as chickens—instead out in entryway so that people can hear it and become curious.

What do all these building have in common? It would seem at first that there is not much. Two of them are vast public works that cost millions and millions of dollars to make and two of them are simple buildings that will never be viewed outside of a small community. One commonality that can be seen even from the pictures though is that they are functional pieces of architecture that also have a sculptural aesthetic.  What does sculptural architecture offer to a community that goes beyond the functionality of the structure?  Perhaps it is simply the sense of wonder and excitement. Perhaps it is a pride in who we are what we can dream up and accomplish. In some cases it connects us to the world around us that we may or may not know about. The Chicken Shack Village works in the spirit of sculptural architecture to give a more rich, textured, and audible voice to the concept and culture of raising hens in an urban environment.

Context (Santiago Pass)

Chicken Shack Village is a collaborative project that fuses functional sculpture, architecture and community art. It engages people through a community art practice that reflects the ideas of the new genre public art movement. Suzanne Lacy, who is prominent in the new genre public art movement explains, "Unlike much of what has heretofore been called public art, new genre public art- visual art that uses both traditional and non-traditional media to communicate and interact with a broad and diversified audience about issues directly relevant to their lives- is based on engagement."

The local Boulder vernacular and historical reference provided a foundation for our investigation of the architectural forms included in the Chicken Shack Village. While the Chicken Shack village is situated in Boulder, Colorado, it provides a model for other communities globally. Consideration to current environmental issues is also a motivating factor. The opportunity to engage in a Chicken Shack Village encompasses a closed loop system and allows members of a community to be active participants concerning the environmental dialogue of sustainable living.

Context (Yolanda)

In regards to the Baseline Group's "Chicken Shack Village," we are working within the realm of art practice that acknowledges and incorporates the surrounding landscape. Thus far in the project, our main aesthetic and conceptual interests lay in these realms of site, history, and architecture. We observe the societal reactions and treatments towards the landscape. We study the history of Boulder's beginnings, and are sensitive to the vernacular architecture specific to Boulder. We observe that architecture in and around Boulder speaks to a larger regional identity, encompassing social constructs such as the strip malls, the mining structures, the "wild west", and a raising interest in environmental consciousness.
In the interdisciplinary spirit of Baseline Group, we have the inevitable need to create collaborations and to move towards creating community-based art. We are interested in involving community members within the building process, as well as reach out to the community through educational components provided throughout our exhibit. The mission of Chicken Shack Village to heighten awareness about raising hens in an urban setting is a vehicle in which Baseline Group can create a seamless and active connection between art and community.

Context (Cobb)

In 1917 Duchamp questioned the world’s established notion of art with his infamous ‘Fountain’. Since then art has grown into countless forms and lives in almost any context. Today some of these forms can be found in the works of Mark Dion, Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Agnes Denes, Tim Rollins and K.O.S., Judith Baca, Joseph Beuys, Harrell Flecther, Ann Hamilton, Dan Peterman, and Adriana Piper. These artists merge art together with social practices and environmental concerns by integrating art into modern day society and community. The mission behind the Baseline Group’s Chicken Shack Village aims to do the same.
The CSV incorporates architecture, environmental concerns, and social practice within the world of art. The chosen aesthetics of our shacks evolved after researching Boulder’s history, investigating its vernacular architecture, and it’s relationship to Colorado’s regional identity. Through the context of art we hope to start a conversation regarding the integration of chickens in urban environments and by proposing alternatives to city dwellers.

Context (Bockelman)

When considering the artistic context that informs the Chicken Shack Village, we must look at the impact of the architectural firm Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates. Both Robert Venturi and his wife Denise Scott Brown have been influential within the architectural world as well as to the Baseline Group because they reject architecture that follows a spare Modernist aesthetic which only includes functional elements. Instead, Venturi and Scott Brown look to the preexistent vernacular architecture of an area for inspiration as well as to symbolic forms that act as visual signposts of communication.

In light of this, the Baseline Group researched the vernacular architecture of Colorado in preparation for creating designs for the chicken shacks. What we chose included references to the historical architecture of Colorado such as that of the mining shack and false fronted building. However, we also chose to emphasize the current architectural trend to use reclaimed materials in chicken shacks that feature a specific material like a shipping pallet or a door.

By becoming immersed in local culture and architectural aesthetic, the Baseline Group hopes to understand and strengthen its connection to the community in which it works.

Context (Schnirel)

Chicken Shack Village inter-mingles art, design, architecture, and the social/political to create functional sculptures that serve the community. The project generates dialogue surrounding the introduction of chickens in a backyard environment. Our group’s comprehensive investigation into Boulder’s vernacular and regional aesthetic influences many of our design decisions. However, we remain aware of the urban chickens’ concept functioning outside Boulder, Colorado and in other communities.

Questions surrounding the taxonomy of the work need not be ignored. We position ourselves in the genre of sculpture; however we derive strength from other fields like service art (a medium that provides for the community), new genre, and public art. Our multifaceted approaches to the artistic process and our diverse backgrounds allow for a constructive conversation for the direction of Chicken Shack Village.

An ongoing awareness to pertinent sustainable solutions also influences the Villages design. In an environment full of Greenwashing and proposed alternatives, we find ourselves utilizing practical ideas that leave less impact, promote stronger local economies, and demote carbon-based fuel demands. Although we merely implement backyard egg production, the resounding affects are an amazing environmental improvement to both the backyard aesthetic and the Boulder identity.