Practitioner in residence and multidisciplinary artist Katharen Wiese held an artist talk in Bucknall Theater on Thursday about her current exhibition on display on campus.
“Hard Leisure,” an exhibition at Seton Gallery open from March 16, explores relationships between individuals and their environments, race, self, movement and consumerism.
The piece in the gallery by the same name—which is also part of the project, “i made the cornrows: Portraits of Black Nebraskans”—is a relief print portrait of nail technician Imagine Uhlenbrock, a friend of Wiese’s, overlaying a collage of pages from the “Negro Travelers’ Greenbook,” a collection of black-owned businesses across the United States published in 1956.
“The dissemination of the print becomes a kind of postcard confronting the difficulties faced by African Americans as they tried to vacation in the United States in the 20th century,” Wiese said in a statement in the exhibition catalogue.
In creating portraits like those of Imagine, Wiese took the time to sit down and interview her subjects to gain a deeper insight into who they were for inspiration on how to portray them.
“I would ask people ‘What are five ideas you think of as central to your understanding of yourself?’” Wiese said.
Wiese said these conversations were time consuming, and sometimes she interviews the same person multiple times to figure out what they considered part of their core identity.
While “Both Eyes Open” isn’t a part of the “Hard Leisure” exhibition, it is another part of her “i made the cornrows project,” and Wiese used her interviewing strategy with another artist friend of hers, Joelle Wellansa Sandfort, before creating the final marbled paper and oil painting.
Wiese said she was pleasantly surprised at the fact that Sandfort’s racial identity wasn’t part of this core interpretation of herself, but rather she viewed herself with an emphasis on her relationship with the world around her, drawing her strength to connect with others from the time she spends with nature.
“I think one really exciting thing about interviewing people is this tension between what you expect them to say or think about themselves, and then what you learn about them,” Wiese said.
The largest piece in the exhibition, “How to smile at the end of our world (a portrait of Uhlenbrock),” is a 104 inch by 106 inch combination relief print and acrylic painting on a layer of recycled materials including kraft paper bags and delaminated cardboard.
The large piece also serves as a commentary on the role of individuals in environmental crises, as the piece depicts Imagine surrounded by living things, while the work itself consists of items of consumerism.
The idea began to form for Wiese during the photoshoot stage, in which she noticed that a plastic water bottle Uhlenbrock held was in frame for a lot of the shots she took.
“It made me think about this sort of tension of the experience between at once being people who are growing things and protecting life and creating life, and at the same time, this inescapability of being wrapped up in these systems of environmental harm, which are often times sort of barely in our control, right?” Wiese said.
In a collaboration between the Yale School of Art and UNH, professor of practice and art coordinator Joseph Smolinski developed a community engaged teaching fellowship position currently held by Wiese and assisted in transporting her art to the gallery.
“Kat is a remarkable artist who works with a variety of materials and techniques,” Smolinski said. “Her work balances an intense investigation of materials and meaning that I find inspiring.”
“While I took on the role of being an academic mentor to Kat, the fact is, I really learned a lot from her!” Smolinski said. “The experience of having Kat be such an integral part of our department has been a highlight of my career here at UNH.”
“Hard Leisure” will remain on display in Seton Gallery until April 10 and Wiese’s other works are available to view at katwiese.com.
