STRATA

CULTIVATE REFLECTS ON THE PHENOMENON OF STRATA

STRATA is an exhibition of artists responding to the theme Strata as broadly as befits their practice and in relation to the town of Hancock, Maryland. Strata are the geological layers that time imprints on the landscape, they are the history lessons that leave treasures like pottery shards and fossils for historians, anthropologists, archeologists and paleontologists to find and use them to weave stories that reinterpret and reimagine our past. More broadly, strata can refer to family lineages, traces of dna that connect the past to the present in our bodies and minds, or can be connected to a particular site or landscape, as in historical environmental patterns no longer present but still creating evolutionary or socio-economic repercussions.

When considering a map of the town of Hancock and its surrounding area, it can also be seen as having layers. Part of an historic “strata” the town’s Main Street is parallel to I-70, the C&O bike path (formerly the C&O rail line), the C&O Canal and its towpath, and the Potomac River.

POETS

DAVID ABRUZZI

CHRISSY ALHART

CULTIVATE is an evolving collection of interdisciplinary artists, writers, and researchers driven by investigations of land, place, and the commons. Projects include experimental and practical art explorations that wrestle with the qualities, perceptions, and layers of experience that inform and expand notions of landscape. Ideas from a full spectrum of voices across generations are supported using sustainable tactics. From the hyper-local to the global, Cultivate reflects individual and collective curiosity, intention, imagining, and engagement with the phenomena of landscape.

ARTISTS

MAGGIE GOURLAY

KATIE KEHOE

SUSAN MAIN

CLAIRE McCONAUGHY

MURAT CEM MENGÜÇ

MJ NEUBERGER

ELZBIETA SIKORSKA

SUE WRBICAN