Oasis in the Woods: Salon and Closing Ceremonies

"Art is Business"

Oasis in the Woods: “Land Art” or “Earth Art,” featuring the pioneering environmental works of four Chicago artists, will open on Friday, August 23, 6-9 p.m. at Loiter Galleries, Long Beach, CA. Over the course of three days, the exhibit will present a host of transformative environmental displays. It marks the first time this exhibit will be presented on the West Coast.

“Land Art” or “Earth Art” involves creating art directly within the landscape, sculpting the land, or using natural materials like rocks and twigs to build structures. It is an ongoing cultural and sustainable experiment that serves as a platform for artists and the community to foster personal and collective transformation.

This unique exhibition will showcase images and elements from the 2023 Junipers Garden’s Oasis in the Woods Environmental Installation, including photographs and maps from the 2013 ‘The Land’ installation. As part of this project, artists will create ‘Land Art’ or ‘Earth Art’ within the gallery using materials from the landscape, resulting in one-of-a-kind installations. 

Selected artists in the collection include:

Caryl Henry Alexander- Visual/Environmental Installation Artist

Alpha Bruton – Visual/Installation Artist

L.A. Happy Hyder – Photograph

Jennifer Andrea “YAYA” Porras – Multi-disciplinary Art Practice

Their collective goal is to build generational bridges, working with ideas and materials that emanate from the land to create installations that answer the pressing question, ‘How do we rebuild our communities to be stronger and recreate sustainable places to live?’ This conversation is crucial as it addresses environmental justice, social and psychological dimensions, and impact.

Exhibition dates:

Friday, August 23, 6-9 pm, Opening Ceremony, “The Gathering”

Saturday, August 24th, from 1 pm to 6 pm: Stories and Artists Talk

Sunday, August 25th, from 7 pm to 9 pm, Salon and Closing Ceremony

Loiter Galleries is located at 425 The Promenade North, Long Beach, CA 90802. As always, we are grateful to the owners of Mosaic, Long Beach, for this pop-up space and for allowing us to carry out our mission of assisting local artists.

For more information and/or to donate to the non-profit gallery’s mission, please go to loitergalleries.com. All donations are tax deductible and support local artists.

Details

Date: August 25

Time: 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

Event Category: Entertainment

Website:

https://www.loitergalleries.com/event-details-registration/oasis-in-the-woods-land-art-exhibition

Organizer Loiter Galleries

Phone: (715) 864-7130

Email: alicelefae@gmail.com

Website: https://www.loitergallerie

2023 Summer Solstice Oasis in The Woods: An Art & Wellness Festival

"Art is Business" Escape to a serene oasis in the woods and immerse yourself in a weekend of art, music, and wellness activities that will rejuvenate you.

"2023 Summer Solstice Oasis in The Woods: An Art & Wellness Festival: This festival is hosted by Junipers Garden, Liminal Grace, Aunt Caryls Art and Herbs, and Phantom Gallery Chicago Network.

Post Discussions:   CREATIVE CONVERSATION on BlogTalkRadio July 5, 2023, 10:30 am EST.

July 5 - July 14, 2023.

For one week, June 12-16, 2023, artists of diverse disciplines and ages will converge at Juniper's Garden for a week-long residency. Their collective goal was to build generational bridges while working with ideas and materials from the land to create installations that answer the question, 

"How we will rebuild our communities to be stronger and recreate sustainable places to live." 

Importantly, this conversation addresses environmental justice's physical and psychological dimensions and impact. The residency occurred in Maryland's Prince Georges's County, the Southernmost region and its remaining rural tier.

On Friday, June 16, 2023, 6–9 pm, as part of the 2023 Summer Solstice Oasis In The Woods: An Art & Wellness Festival at Juniper's Garden, the artists hosted an open house where they presented and offered free and open to the public gallery walks. In addition, they contributed stories of their experiences with the South County ecosystem and the process by which their installations came together. 

About The Host/Artist

HOST: Samaria Marley 

Samaria is a musician, farmer, and herbalist. Her music and art are inspired by her relationship with nature and her experience as an adoptee and healer. Samaria's music blends traditional folk with afro-beat, R&B, and hip-hop elements. Most recently, she has been exploring the history, music, and construction of the Banjo. As an herbalist, she works to reconnect her community to traditional ways of healing.

About The Artists
Caryl Henry Alexander

Bittersweet, found wood, metallic copper, fabric

Caryl building the sculpture.

For more than 40 years, Caryl Henry Alexander's Work has harnessed the power of creative collaboration with multi-generational, multicultural, and interfaith communities to conceive, design, and implement community art projects in diverse public settings around the globe. In the studio, Caryl's Work includes painting, printmaking, papermaking, textiles, installations, and sculpture. Her media are both traditional and experimental, often incorporating recycled or found objects and natural plant materials. Out in the community, she combines her roles as a visual artist, teaching artist, curator, researcher, lecturer, writer, and social activist to support communities in clarifying their shared goals and turning their ideas into action. Her long-term focus is on culture, environment, and nature. She has exhibited throughout the US and abroad. Her media are both traditional and experimental, often incorporating recycled or found objects and natural plant materials.

Alpha Bruton

Grandmother's Circle: A Tribute to Sallie Alpha and Crecy Ivory

Smudging Ceremony Performed by Rabiah Al-Nur

Chief Curator Phantom Gallery Chicago Network. The Phantom Galleries are temporary exhibitions in nontraditional gallery settings. The mission of the (PGCN) is to promote the betterment of the visual arts community through the arts, promote personal achievement in striving for excellence and continual growth as an artist, and promote cultural activities in exhibits, workshops; galleries exhibitions; art centers; artists in residence projects. She is the Co-founder of the Visual Arts Development Project (VADP), formed in 1996. Is an art service organization - developing projects as living experiments for sustainable practices and an incubator for personal and collective transformation. Visual Arts Development Project is a community-based art organization that provides children, adults, and emerging artists with resources, workshops, and a venue to show and express their art form.

About The artist GIGI

Gigi is a 200-hr certified yoga instructor and eternal student of life. In 2021, she founded Liminal Grace to help folks navigate life with mindfulness, confidence, and ease. Gigi's teaching reflects these intentions by honoring the nuances and complexities of the human experience while encouraging individual power and curiosity along the way. Liminal Grace offers live yoga and meditation sessions, corporate wellness programming and retreats, and educational mindfulness courses, and hosts mindfulness events and retreats.

About the artist Chantel

Her crochet spread that comforted her during the Covid-19 Pandemic

Chantel (she/her) is a Caribbean-American multidisciplinary artist and spiritual diviner. She has yet to find a medium she won't try at least once and often cycles through periods of focusing on one or three mediums more than others. She is currently focusing on fiber arts and collage. After learning how to knit through TikTok and YouTube University, she is working on replacing her storebought sweaters and knitwear with clothes she knit or crocheted. She learned how to crochet from her mother at a young age and often has at least two fiber projects going at once. She uses collages for emotional expression and has led therapeutic art journaling and collaging sessions for over 7 years. After completing her Master's in Social Work at the University of Maryland, Baltimore, in May 2023, she plans to become an art therapist and incorporate creative self-expression into her therapy practice.

About this event

Oasis In The Woods: An Arts & Wellness Festival is an immersive intergenerational experience where art and nature intertwine to bring you beautiful and thought-provoking nature-based art installations, wellness experiences,s and more.

Phantom Gallery Chicago, Grandmother's Circle

Five Black and Indigenous artists-healers from DC, PG County, and Chicago will reside at Junipers Garde in Brandywine, MD, for the week leading up to the festival. During their residence,y they will build nature-based art installations and wellness experiences inspired by nature, the plan, and the vision of creating a more just and sustainable ecosystem in the face of climate change.

The culmination of the residency was a two-day festival where guests had the opportunity to experience these art installations and wellness experiences, contribute to the land through community art projects, and enjoy good food, live music, and community.

The Pause Portal is a space of presence, reflection, and rest. Step into this liminal space for a mind, body, and soul reset. Before walking through the art installations, pause with Gigi at 1:30 pm and 3:30 pm for a yoga nidra (yogic sleep) to prepare you for your walks. The yoga nidra sessions are meditative experiences that can be done lying down or sitting in a chair. Cushions, blankets, chairs, and more will be provided in the portal.

Caryl Henry Alexander facilitated the Gallery Art walk/Art talk.

Saturday, Gallery Art Walk

Passed on the flame to young artist "Z" during the AIR.

On Friday, June 16, join the artists for an Artist Reception, Gallery Walk, and Artist Panel. This evening on the land, you will meet the artists, hear the stories andWorkpiration behind their work, and experience the installations. Enjoy delicious gourmet pizza and drinks during the reception.

Art Installations and Community Art Project, guests took self-directed walks on the trails at Junipers Garden and experienced the nature-based art installations designed by the artists in residence.

Food Vendors

Green Things Work will offer a plant-based loaded nacho bar, chlorophyll lemonade, seasonal fruit cups, and popsicles. Vonte's Kitchen will offer Grilled Chicken Wings, Crab Cake sandwiches, and Beer Brisket sandwiches with Mac & Cheese or Fried Rice.

Enjoy live music from the DC-based music collective Too Much Talent Band, with one purpose, Make Good Music.

Fire Spinners We experienced an exciting show from fire spinners Umber and Ember.

We celebrated the summer solstice with a massive bonfire, great music, and dancing. Planning is underway for June 21st, 2024 Summer Solstice. 

                                            Folks sat around the fire and watched the flames.

On-site Camping-site was only available on Saturday, June 17. 

Several campers spent the night in the woods at Junipers Garden and woke up on "The Land."

Thank you for all the work that was invested into this project. It is the beginning of a more extensive conversation. 

Resource: https://review42.com/resources/types-of-sage-for-smudging/

Sage as a Spiritual Tool

Although burning sage is used by healers and laypeople in traditional cultures to achieve a healing state or solve or meditate on spiritual difficulties, this practice could also have a scientific basis—certain types of sage are best for smudging for cleansing and spiritual purposes, like white prairie sage contain thujone, which is somewhat psychotropic and present in a variety of plants used in cultural, spiritual rituals to boost intuition.

7-mile water trail explores hidden history, including Chicago's only Bla...

https://youtu.be/pFKskHpgqHE

The African American Heritage Water Trail encourages people to reflect on history from a different perspective.

Directions:  The African American Heritage Water Trail begins at the boat ramp to the Little Calumet River at the Cook County Forest Preserves’ Beaubien Woods.  It ends at Robbins, approximately 7 miles west. Paddling access is planned for construction near Kedzie in the Village of Robbins. In the interim, put in at Beaubien Woods and take out at the Alsip Boat Launch, a few miles west of Robbins.  To paddle just half of the trail, put in at Beaubien Woods and take out at the Forest Preserves of Cook County’s Little Calumet Boat Ramp. This ramp is on the Upper Little Calumet River and can be reached by paddling into the south side channel that confluences with the main trail 0.5 miles west of the Halsted Street bridge.  Once you have paddled onto the Upper Little Calumet River, the concrete boat ramp will be visible on the west side in 0.5 miles.  You can also put in at the Little Calumet Boat Ramp and take out at Alsip Boat Launch, paddling the other half of the trail.

Historical Importance: This stretch of the river flows through several south-side Chicago neighborhoods and nearly two centuries of African American history—sites and figures who whose impact remains with us today. The Heritage Water Trail honors this history by tracing the remarkable stories of African Americans who settled along the river: freedom seekers who traveled the Underground Railroad, trailblazers who defied discrimination and achieved great feats in their fields, and pioneers in the struggle for civil rights and environmental justice. These acts of courage and fortitude have shaped our nation and left their mark on significant events in African American history, including:

Underground Railroad: Before the Civil War, thousands of people fleeing slavery passed through Chicago or its south suburbs where they found a supportive community willing to hide, feed and help them on their way. Ton Farm was a well-documented stop on the Underground Railroad; and Dolton Ferry and Bridge provided an important passage for hundreds of freedom seekers crossing the river on their way to Canada via Chicago or Detroit.

Civil Rights: Many important pioneers in the struggle for civil rights left their mark here and across the nation. Especially notable people and sites include Bishop Louis Henry Ford, the minister and advocate for whom the freeway was named; Larry Hawkins, the teacher, mentor, and coach; Marshall “Major” Taylor, the first African American international sports star and a world champion bicycle rider; Chicago’s Finest Marina, the oldest black-owned marina in the Chicago region; and the Village of Robbins, unique in its support of African American entrepreneurs and wealth creation.

The Birth of Environmental Justice:  Environmental justice is a civil rights movement demanding reforms to protect people of color who are disproportionately exposed to environmental hazards where they live and work. Altgeld Gardens, one of the first public housing developments in the U.S., is where it all began, under the leadership of local resident Hazel Johnson.

Welcoming Communities:  Altgeld Gardens was originally designed as a model “Garden City”—a self-contained community of residences and green space. In the segregated landscape of Chicago, it attracted the settlement of other black families into surrounding neighborhoods like Golden Gate, Riverside Village, Pangea Lakes and Concordia Place. A bit further down the river is the Village of Robbins, one of the very few towns in the United States governed at its incorporation by African Americans. It attracted black Chicagoans seeking economic opportunities and leisure activities free of white harassment.

For a complete guide to the sites and landmarks along the river, visit the African-American Heritage Water Trail Storymap which you can print and take on your excursion. You can also download the brochure.