August 10, 2023 | Staten Island, NY— Snug Harbor Cultural Center & Botanical Garden is excited to announce a new outdoor public art installation: THE WORLD WHICH IS MADE OF OUR LOVE by Catherine Cullen. Visitors can learn more at https://snug-harbor.org/newhousecenter/
The installation will launch on August 19, 2023 from 2:00 PM – 4:00 PM on the Northeast Meadow Lawn at Snug Harbor with a celebratory public reception. Admission to the opening is on a sliding scale, with $5-10 suggested. The artwork will be on view through November 19, 2023. Visitors can register for the Public Art Opening at https://snug-harbor.org/event/public-art-opening-this-world-which-is-made-of-our-love-by-catherine-cullen/
“The grand trees and botanic garden plantings of Snug Harbor have been an inspiration to experiment and to think. My sculpture flows from questions about how to live in a world of wonders and terrors. The cycles of decay and new growth in nature are powerful metaphors for the beauty and bewilderment, endings and new beginnings that occur in a life,” said artist Catherine Cullen.
“Snug Harbor is the perfect venue for public art, with 83-acres of interesting and diverse landscapes. The Newhouse Center is excited to expand our exhibition programming outdoors for Catherine Cullen’s THE WORLD WHICH IS MADE OF OUR LOVE, inviting visitors to consider the relationship art can have with nature and the built environment,” said Melissa West, Director & Senior Curator, Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art.
Introspective in the extrospective arena, the exhibition continues the artist’s meditations on the inter-relatedness of humans and the natural world. A Janus-faced head of carved limestone, sited in a copse of trees, dreams of regeneration on one side, streams the stars and rivers on the other. Retreat, hibernation and fallow periods give access to the riches of the unconscious and to the super conscious, or that which is beyond everyday material existence. Nearby, a welded steel homage to the mythic Meandash, a Sami shaman woman who shapeshifts between human, animal and cosmic realms hovers at the point of transformation. The exhibition courts enthrallment and the dynamics of opposition and tension, albeit without the need to dominate or subjugate, an approach that draws on the world views of Taoism and many indigenous cultures.
Cullen’s grants include SI Arts DCA Premiere, City Artists Corp, Makerspace Artist-in-residence funded by NYC Dept of Cultural Affairs, CERF+ and Artists Fellowship as well as residencies at MacDowell Colony, VCCA and Millay Colony, among others. Poems have appeared in the Madrigal and Wild Roof Journal. A clay apprenticeship in Mashiko, Japan introduced the artist to Buddhist sculpture and the spatial concept of ma.
Snug Harbor Cultural Center & Botanical Garden is located at 1000 Richmond Terrace, Staten Island, NY and is open from dawn until dusk, seven days a week. This outdoor exhibition can be viewed at all times during Snug Harbor’s regular operating hours.
This exhibition is made possible through generous support from the Samuel I. Newhouse Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature, and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council. Additional support made possible by a DCA Premier Grant from Staten Island Arts, with public funding from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.
Snug Harbor arts programming is made possible through generous support from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature, Humanities New York, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, Con Edison – Arts al Fresco, Dance/NYC Rehearsal Space Subsidy, Howard Gilman Foundation and the Samuel I. Newhouse Foundation.
About the Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art at Snug Harbor
The Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art is Staten Island’s leading incubator for bold and innovative art. Through exhibitions, residencies, performances, public art, and related public programming, we activate historical, architectural, and environmental connections throughout Snug Harbor’s 83-acre cultural campus in conversation with our contemporary culture. The Newhouse Center encompasses 15,000 square feet of space including the Main Hall Gallery, the oldest landmarked building on campus. The Newhouse Center promotes inquiry and advances scholarship through contemporary art subjects. The Newhouse Center was the flagship program when Snug Harbor opened as a cultural institution in 1977, and has served as a vibrant space for creativity, connection, and community for over 45 years.
About Snug Harbor
Snug Harbor Cultural Center & Botanical Garden is where art, history and nature converge. We offer dynamic programming in the arts, horticulture and agriculture for diverse communities and all ages, on our historic 83-acre campus. We envision being a locally impactful, globally renowned destination, true to our values of artistic vibrancy and community, inclusion and discovery, stewardship and conservation. Snug Harbor is the result of more than four decades of restoration and development to convert a 19th-century charitable rest home for sailors into a regional arts center, botanical gardens and public park. One of the largest ongoing adaptive reuse projects in America, Snug Harbor encompasses 26 historic structures, 14 botanical gardens, a 2.5-acre urban farm, wetlands, forests and park land on a free, open campus. Snug Harbor is a proud Smithsonian Affiliate organization. Learn more at snug-harbor.org.
For Immediate Release
Contact: Meredith Sladek
msladek@snug-harbor.org
(718) 425-3515
