Check out the stunning artwork that's been shown at the Urban Ecology Center over the years!
The shows are sorted by the year the show began. Click the year to start or just scroll down.
2020
Click on the thumbnails to see information about the artist.
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Pollinators and Prairies
December 2019 through February 2020 - Menononee Valley
Escuela Verde's Field Research Team
In Escuela Verde's Field Research Team, students explore the natural world around them through the practice of community science. Works in this show speak out about issues of conservation, preservation, climate change and environmental justice. -
Jeff McAvoy
January 2020 through March 2020 - Riverside Park
Jeff McAvoy is the Urban Ecology Center’s Director of Marketing and Communications and has been fortunate enough to have Riverside Park just steps away from his desk and regular occasions to visit Washington and Three Bridges Parks for the past ten years. Jeff has been able to draw creative inspiration from these three parks for the graphics and branding of the Urban Ecology Center in his marketing role and more recently in his personal digital fine art practice. He loves choosing subjects for his digital paintings that can be observed in the natural world in Milwaukee and beyond. Jeff’s digital paintings have a traditional oil painting feel but his brush strokes are created with software and a stylus. Also on display will be a selection design and illustration work done for UEC programs over the past decade.Jeff McAvoy is the Urban Ecology Center’s Director of Marketing and Communications and has been fortunate enough to have Riverside Park just steps away from his desk and regular occasions to visit Washington and Three Bridges Parks for the past ten years. Jeff has been able to draw creative inspiration from these three parks for the graphics and branding of the Urban Ecology Center in his marketing role and more recently in his personal digital fine art practice. He loves choosing subjects for his digital paintings that can be observed in the natural world in Milwaukee and beyond. Jeff’s digital paintings have a traditional oil painting feel but his brush strokes are created with software and a stylus. Also on display will be a selection design and illustration work done for UEC programs over the past decade. -
Heidi Koester
January 2020 through March 2020 - Riverside Park
Heidi Koester has always had a great love for animals, insects, and art. She enjoys combining her love for these by exploring them in her creative process. They have served as a source of fascination, in both their form and hidden beauty. Through painting, photography, illustration, and printmaking, Heidi has reached an entirely new level of observation and understanding. She hopes to share this with others so that they too will begin to appreciate these creatures if only for the small glimpses of splendor they offer wherever they are found. Heidi’s artwork focuses on the animals and critters that live and thrive in our Milwaukee neighborhoods. -
Maggie Szpot
January 2020 through March 2020 - Riverside Park
Maggie Szpot is an emerging visual artist based in Milwaukee. No matter the medium, her goal as a visual artist has always been to inspire the viewer to share her passion for wildlife and the natural environment. She does this by depicting animals and nature in spectacular, unusual ways, whether it is through the vibrant colors and loose strokes in her paintings or through the entertaining edits in her photography and videos. The Wild House exhibition originally started as an experiment in digital composting. Maggie began by photographing taxidermy exhibits from various local natural history museums and then digitally compositing images of the home, creating a striking dichotomy between the “wild” and the “domestic”. -
Honoring Mother Earth
March through May 2020 - Menononee Valley
K5 and 4th graders from Indian Community School (2019-2020)
At Indian Community School, we recognize our connection to the land, water, our ancestors, and theAt Indian Community School, we recognize our connection to the land, water, our ancestors, and theother caregivers who came before us. ChicoryRooted in the belief that food is medicine, we take great care ingrowing and tending gardens on our school grounds. Our entire school benefits from the gifts of ourgarden as we harvest each season.Fourth grade students took some time to study the gardens, as well as explore their surroundings withan artistic eye. Using keen photographic and observational skills, they created paintings of their findings.Early artists in K5 worked collaboratively with their “Repairing Together” counterparts at MilwaukeeJewish Day School to create giant collages of the same natural landscape. ICS Kinder artists finishedthem up with paint and pastel rubbing.We honor Mother Earth by taking care of her and celebrating her beauty and gifts. Indian Community School, 2019-2020 Art Teacher: Christina Ramirez -
Invisible and Visible Mending
June 2020 through August 2020 - Menononee Valley
Nancy Aten
UEC's first Online Art Gallery! See it here: https://www.landscapesofplace.com/gallery
Sometimes ecological restoration activities can be “eco-revelatory”, that is, can reveal what are otherwise un-noticed behaviors or functions in the ecosystem. This can help us understand how things work. Like, planting a whole bunch of little bluestem grass in a long weaving drift of a pattern, oriented in such a way that in the late afternoon on a certain trail it simply glows in the sun, and you can’t help but learn what this grass looks like and how the seed fluffs to blow with the wind. Or, leaving a permanent vegetation sampling quadrat in the field, drawing attention to changes in species richness over time: two years ago, it was all switchgrass; today, I see it has five other flowering species I can count.
This exhibit explores fractures and wounds in the landscape, and mending that happens with ecological restoration, both invisibly and visibly.
2019
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Kelli Greentree & Phyllis Bankier
January through March 2019 - Riverside Park
Everything is Energy and Interaction
Phyllis Bankier has been volunteering with the UEC’s ROOTS for several years and along the way, getting to know the wildflowers that bloom in Riverside Park and Rotary Arboretum. While seeing the prairie and woodlands thrive with diverse flora and fauna, Phyllis appreciates the dedication and knowledge of UEC staff to preserve and enhance these natural areas. Phyllis’ photographs are like portraits, capturing the essence of beauty within a moment in time, enabling viewers to see the intricacies and details of nature, encouraging a walk outside. Kelli Greentree loves the outdoors: a breath of air after rain, the warmth of the sun on her skin, the sounds of the forest, the taste of wild mulberries, the view of the sunset from up high, the sheer joy she experiences while riding her bicycle. And, she loves color: bright and cheery, dark and creepy, she loves it all, and enjoys putting colors together - to jump of the canvas and make it breathe. These inspirations drive her art, allowing her to share her vision of what surrounds us. -
SWAN Day MKE 2019
March through May 2019 - Menomonee Valley
Water: Reflection, Ritual, and Resource
Artists from all over Milwaukee celebrate the power and diversity of women’s creativity at SWAN Day MKE 2019, an exhibition that is part of the International 12th Annual Support Women Artists Now Day! This exhibit featured over one-hundred woman-identified artists of ALL ages, ALL disciplines and ALL levels of artistic experience residing in Milwaukee and surrounding area that were invited to be part of an inclusive, informal, non-juried show. -
So Much Life through Photography
April through June 2019 - Riverside Park
The long-standing Photo Club at the Urban Ecology Center is a talented and dedicated group of photographers. With this exhibit beginning during Earth Month, in the time of spring wildflowers, breeding herptiles and migrating birds, their photographs of the wildlife in our midst and throughout the year will inspire you. See through photographers’ eyes: native flora, winter ice, migrating birds, and more - and nature from travels afar, too. Maybe you will look more closely, enjoy the outdoors with new eyes and perspectives, celebrate all the life of the Urban Ecology Center, and maybe pick up a camera yourself. -
Beth Stoddard
June through August 2019 - Menomonee Valley
Milwaukee County Parks Painting Project
City dwelling landscape painter Beth Stoddard delights in and advocates for Milwaukee’s green spaces by painting its County Parks. The oil paintings' visible brushwork and modernist emphasis on shape activate the restful imagery of familiar urban parks and nature preserves. These pieces respond to a cultural, natural, and civic inheritance worth preserving. -
Beth Stoddard & Danielle Bell
October through December 2019 - Riverside Park
Milwaukee County Parks Painting Project & The Details of Nature
An art exhibition of photographs and oil paintings provides views both focused and expansive of area ecosystems. Danielle Bell’s Details of Nature photography invites the viewer to appreciate the smaller features of plant and animal life. Beth Stoddard’s Milwaukee County Parks Painting Project represents the spacious Parks system’s varied scenery. Together these artists mount a show that urges us to heed John Muir’s call to “saunter through nature and stop walking past the landscape all around us.” As a landscape designer and photographer, Danielle Bell sees a need to slow down and observe the features of the landscape from different perspectives. “So many times people walk past the landscape surrounding their home or place of work instead of enjoying and exploring it. As a society we need to come back to our roots and no longer see our front yard as a static element but as a living, diverse ecosystem.” By removing all outside clutter in her photographs, Danielle creates a hyper-focused moment of time capturing important details in nature that people overlook.
City dwelling landscape painter Beth Stoddard delights in Milwaukee’s green spaces by painting its County Parks. Her oil paintings' visible brushwork and modernist emphasis on shape activate the restful imagery of familiar urban parks and nature preserves. “Just over halfway through my project to paint all 169 of the parks, I continue to be surprised and delighted by the variety of views they offer, as well as how they facilitate a city dweller’s contact with the natural world.”
2018
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Pete Railand
January through March 2018 - Riverside Park
From the show "Reflecting Stories All Around Us"Born in Milwaukee, raised in the north woods of Wisconsin, Pete returned to Milwaukee. His artistic practice is based on the belief that the transformative power of personal expression in concert with collective action has great potential to transform society. He is a founding member of the Justseeds Artists' Cooperative. Justseeds is a decentralized community of artists who together create and sell prints, blog, build art installations, curate shows, publish books and portfolios, and contribute graphics to grassroots struggles for social and environmental justice, all while offering each other support as allies and friends. His practice begins in the world of traditional printmaking, often utilizing the relief printing medium to address environmental and social justice themes. -
Leann Wooten
January through March 2018 - Riverside Park
From the show "Reflecting Stories All Around Us"Leann works with ceramic, glass, and an array of contemporary materials to create imagery and environments that make an impact. She worked with sixty neighborhood kids to create the large mosaic at the Urban Ecology Center Menomonee Valley branch. Leann has served as lead artist for many organizations including Arts @ Large, Artists Working in Education (AWE), and Redline. Formerly a painter, in love with texture, she began adding objects to my canvases. Now working in mosaic art, she does the reverse, sometimes adding a little paint to her mosaics. She works intuitively, so the process is never too preplanned. She builds dimension with a broad variety of materials, and many times a found object is the first thing that triggers the whole created process, exploring the world around her and recycling it into something new and unexpected. -
SWAN Day MKE 2018: Laur Wiech Design
March through May 2018 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "SWAN Day MKE 2018: Women and Nature: Nourishing Our Roots"Artists from all over Milwaukee celebrate the power and diversity of women’s creativity at SWAN Day MKE 2018 (Support Women Artists Now), an exhibition that is part of the International 11th Annual Support Women Artists Now Day! This exhibit featured over one-hundred women and woman-identified artists of ALL ages, ALL disciplines and ALL levels of artistic experience residing in Milwaukee and surrounding area that were invited to be part of an inclusive, informal, non-juried show.
The 2018 theme was “Women and Nature: Nourishing Our Roots.” -
Geri Schrab
April through June 2018 - Riverside Park
From the show "Love of the Ancients"The focus of Geri's artwork is the study of petroglyphs and pictographs, images pecked, carved and painted on rock surfaces by the ancient indigenous people of North America. These original "rock art" images may not have been considered art at the time, but recordings of the stories, journeys, hunts and visions; in essence, the history of the original people. As those of us not indigenous have adopted this land, it is important to listen to this history and learn.
Geri’s creative process is to personally visit these ancient sacred sites, photograph or sketch on site; from these research materials she creates paintings in studio. Her paintings go directly from heart to brush to paper, with the rock art and nature as guides. It is her intention through this work to share her love of the ancients, the beauty of nature and this gentle healing energy with others. -
Steven Yeo
July through September 2018 - Riverside Park
From the show "Closer Encounters"Steven has professional training in natural history and biology and has worked as an aquatic biologist for over 30 years. He holds a viewpoint similar to that expressed by naturalists such as Leopold, Muir and Thoreau - a more emotional, transcendent perspective. With constructive montage images from Wisconsin natural areas, parks, trails, urban greenways and restoration areas (and sometimes from a microscope), his work explores our cognitive and emotional connection to our existence as part of the natural world. -
Kathleen Walter
June through August 2018 - Menomonee Valley
Human <> Nature"
From the artist: My work is reflective of the synergistic connections I see between man and nature. I am interested in the ever-widening concentric circles of connectedness between all things on earth and beyond. My investigations have brought me to a realization of the commonality of many systems in nature and the manmade world and the similarity of mythologies and metaphors surrounding both realms. The maps that are part of much of my collage work have become the symbol for our human need to control and contain nature. (A theme that seems to have a louder voice in the present culture.) The messages that nature is sending into the universe are being silenced by ignorance and fear and threatening the existence of human life on earth. The intent of my work is to bring a moment of reflection to the fabric of nature of which humans are a part. -
Julie Raasch
July through September 2018 - Riverside Park
From the show "Closer Encounters"Julie can often be seen toting her camera wherever she goes, always in search of the next photographic opportunity. Her images ask: Have you ever stopped to check out the colors of the lichens that grow on the tree next to your home? What do you see in a flower during a rain shower? She likes to play with light, and find the best perspective to see how light interacts with her subject - from above, below, or at eye level. Julie hopes we take a few minutes to look a little closer and see nature at its finest. -
Melissa Courtney
October through December 2018 - Riverside Park
Stories of Symbiosis and Synchronicity
Melissa Courtney Melissa’s work is interdisciplinary in paint, print and textiles. She believes in connection: that as in nature, we all need each other to live. This series of abstract work is about pieces that need each other to “survive”, and feed off each other visually. She symbolizes things found in nature that are essential in symbiotic relationships; i.e., water, nests, roots and oxygen. Thick paint and short, deliberate brush strokes create a feeling of movement; in nature, something is always moving, evolving. Water rushing, wind blowing, life growing. -
Marly Gisser
October through December 2018 - Riverside Park
Stories of Symbiosis and Synchronicity
Marly has always been drawn to old, patinated wooden surfaces, and finds materials in cast-off urban trash, recycled found items, and natural items such as pine needles, shells, stones, bark. The active searching for materials amidst discarded items aligns with the Urban Ecology Center’s tenet to recycle whenever possible. Putting these things together to create an assemblage often involves story-telling with the objects. This process of assembling seems one of synchronicity; where there is an intuitive feeling for what belongs together and what does not. -
Kc Harrison
October through December 2018 - Riverside Park
Stories of Symbiosis and Synchronicity
Kc observes other living beings with open intentions, hoping to learn from them, imagining the many unique ways life is experienced. With the resourcefulness and craftiness of many animal species in mind, she mimics their gathering instinct and uses found and repurposed material, working intuitively, instinctively, and sustainably. Her drawings describe the process of making sculptural ‘stagings’ of stories in nature, asking the viewer to imagine from the beast’s point of view, to be receptive to new interpretations, and always to empathize with the subject. -
Changing Our World Through Art: The Work of Escuela Verde's Youth Artivists
September – November 2018 - Menomonee Valley
In Escuela Verde's Art Club, we use our artistic skills and voices to work for change in our community. The work in this show speaks out about issues ranging from climate change and environmental racism to immigration reform and gender inequality. -
Nakoa Moonblood
December 2018 through February 2019 - Menomonee Valley
"Bridging the Gap : Remembering the Past to Build a Better Future"
Milwaukee born Native American Artist Nakoa Moonblood uses visual and performance art to showcase Native American culture, the importance of respecting nature, and the strength that comes with community unity. The Bridging The Gap project is a showcase of the history of the Menomonee Valley amongst local tribes and shines light on the current revitalization of the land and community through drawings, paintings, photography, songs, and dance.
2017
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Composite Organisms - Sue Lawton
December 2017 - February 2018 -Menomonee Valley
From the show "The Forgotten Invasion: Artifacts"The artifacts and images in this installation tell the story of time-traveling refugees from a distant moon as they struggle to adapt to their new homes and lives. Using found objects, ink on paper and altered mirrors, along with natural samples of lichen and moss, the works reexamine the classic "alien invasion" story and it's misguided parallels and comparisons in discussions of invasive species and of human migration. They are based on The Forgotten Invasion; a series of science fiction artist books that draw on themes of invasion and reclamation, collective amnesia, and cultural abandonment. -
Tula Erskine
October through December 2017 - Riverside Park
From the show "Tula Erskine's Mushrooms"In this show we honor Tula the naturalist, the artist, the mycologist and community scientist, together – each skill enhanced by the others. Included will be more than forty exquisite mushroom illustrations meant for a never-published book to be called Mushrooms of North America. Tula’s tools for examining plants, other paintings, drawings, spore prints, rubbings, and slides will complete the exhibit. -
Nicole Acosta
September through November 2017 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "PachaMAMAS y Niñxs""Born and raised in Milwaukee, I have devoted my life fully as a compassionate pictoralist and my work often reflects the exploration and preservation of culture, identity, movement and oral & visual storytelling. I am inspired by travel, magical herbs and my children. I use photography as a tool to preserve my personal stories and Illustrate what I witness while navigating through motherhood, a womyn of color and as a chicana." -
Sarah Eichhorn
July through September 2017 - Riverside Park
From the show "Waves, Impressions, Traces"Allowing nature to take its course, Sarah’s handwoven shibori tapestries showcase organic patterns and textures that are reminiscent of ripples in a pond, clouds in the sky, or shadows at sunset. Each weaving is naturally dyed and connects us to familiar memories of the outdoors. -
Laura Priebe
July through September 2017 - Riverside Park
From the show "Waves, Impressions, Traces"Laura grew up with nearby woods and water that were alive with friends. Her sculpture and drawings fulfill a quest to protect the freedom within this land, within this water, for all life. Her artwork is a language constructing abstract sensuality and realistic representation of natural forms and elements, teaching love and respect for the needed assurances all living things on earth require. To this day, all life on earth depends on water. History of the Silurian period, when this area was completely covered in water, has added for her another adventure into the water critters living then, based on fossils. -
Auditioning for the Choir - Jenie Gao
June through August 2017 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "The Globe Weaver"The Globe Weaver is Jenie Gao's most recent series of prints and drawings that together tell the story of what it means to be local in a globalized world. This story is told through animals in urban and rural settings, each one navigating its own complicated relationship with the world. Some thrive. Some adapt. Some struggle to survive. Some fight to make a life again, after past threats of displacement, disease, and genocide. Many assimilate. Still others enjoy impressive and precarious success, challenging the stigmas they can't ever seem to shake. -
Tonia Kountz
April through June 2017 - Riverside Park
From the show "A Walk in the Woods and Mostly Milwaukee Mushrooms"Coming from a family whose foraging included wild mushrooms, it seemed natural to Tonia to draw them. Most of the mushrooms drawn were picked in Milwaukee, posed for their picture on the artist’s kitchen table and sometimes ended up as the evening meal. -
Trilliums - Bridget Lyle Wolf
April through June 2017 - Riverside Park
From the show "A Walk in the Woods and Mostly Milwaukee Mushrooms"Bridget Wolf illustrates years of painting and hiking along the Milwaukee River and its natural environs as well as the rest of Wisconsin. -
Wisconsin River Backwater - Prairie Du Chein - Daniel Stauff
April through June 2017 - Riverside Park
From the show "A Walk in the Woods and Mostly Milwaukee Mushrooms"Daniel Stauff illustrates years of painting and hiking along the Milwaukee River and its natural environs as well as the rest of Wisconsin. -
Emmet Gross
March through May 2017 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "Steel, Concrete, and Water: Forming the Industrial American City"Artist Emmett Gross explores the relationship between human built patterns and natural forms. As he studies the industrial history of American cities, he tells a story of the physical, social, and economic forces that shape these urban forms. He hopes that his work will lead the viewer to delve into the history of cities. -
Navigating the Night - Jean Dexter Sobon
January through March 2017 -Riverside Park
From the show "In The Balance"Jean Dexter Sobon's exhibition reflects on the disconnect existing between our own species and the larger part of the natural world that sustains us. Each is a visual metaphor with a story, question or lesson. Some are based in history or myth. Others are Sobon's imaginative musings.
2016
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High Risk of Cancer - Scenes from Superfund Wisconsin - C. Matthew Luther
October through December 2016 - Riverside Park
From the show "Advocacy and Sustaining Life"The Superfund Project is an emergent archive of environmental pollution in Wisconsin. Many of these sites are located within inner city neighborhoods labeled as Environmental Justice areas and defined as communities with high populations of low-income, minority or tribal residents who may endure a lop-sided share of the nationʼs environmental waste and pollution problems. Milwaukeeʼs Riverwest and Harambee neighborhoods are defined as Environmental Justice areas and home to two Superfund Sites along with numerous Brownfields. -
Whooping Crane - Ellen McGaughey
October through December - Riverside Park
From the show "Cranes Among Us"Cranes represent an ancient spiritual wildness, like their haunting bugle call that is a salve to spirit and an accelerant to creativity! In Wisconsin, cranes tell a tale of the Sandhill's emergence from near extinction in the 1930's and the Whooping Crane's perilous course of survival today. -
Sandpiper - Lainet Garcia-Rivera
October through December 2016 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "Visions of the Valley"Presented by the Photo Phenology Group and Young Scientist Club of the Urban Ecology Center's Menomonee Valley branch, this photo exhibition captures the changing landscape of the Menomonee Valley. -
Eye Level - Menomonee Valley Young Scientists Club
October through December 2016 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "Visions of the Valley"Presented by the Photo Phenology Group and Young Scientist Club of the Urban Ecology Center's Menomonee Valley branch, this photo exhibition captures the changing landscape of the Menomonee Valley. -
From Below - Menomonee Valley Young Scientists Club
October through December 2016 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "Visions of the Valley"Presented by the Photo Phenology Group and Young Scientist Club of the Urban Ecology Center's Menomonee Valley branch, this photo exhibition captures the changing landscape of the Menomonee Valley. -
Untitled (domesticated in MesoAmerica) - Thomas Gaudynski
July through September 2016 - Riverside Park
From the show "Discovered While Paying Attention"These drawings grow out of my practice of backyard gardening. Drawn with ink and brush in black on white, they explore some of the efforts of one urban gardener working with raised bed gardens acquired over years through Milwaukeeʼs Victory Garden initiative. -
Jumping Fox - James Steeno
July through September 2016 - Riverside Park
From the show "Discovered While Paying Attention"Painting with watercolor can be a challenge as water tends to move around, but that same changeable nature can lead to many great accidental visual discoveries. I love to paint local landscapes and wildlife, and enjoy hearing the stories people tell of Wisconsin. My works are on a scale similar to the nooks and crannies where stories are shared. -
Janelle Gramling
June through September 2016 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "Symbiotic"In my wall-hung sculptures, fiber, wood, and clay are combined in very deliberate and simple ways intended to make the viewer ponder it’s construction. Themes of ecology, balance, and interconnectedness speak through the ways in which strands of fiber weave their way though geometric forms in clay and wrap around branches of found driftwood. -
Generation 3 - Rachel Clark
April through June 2016 - Riverside Park
From the show "Generation 3 (a special sculptural installation)"As our population continues to expand, habitats for monarch butterflies, as well as many other organisms, begin to dwindle. An industrial park in Wauwatosa has seen major construction, deterring these butterflies from returning to a once important breeding spot. Despite efforts from locals to protect and improve habitat, the butterfly numbers are not the same as they once were. Created in response to the continuing loss of monarch butterfly habitats, this exhibit draws attention to the value of urban natural areas as sanctuaries for these beautiful butterflies. -
How Strong Is an Ant - Carol Schwartz
April through June 2016 - Riverside Park
From the show "Delight and Wonder"Nature inspires every creative step I make and continually surprises and astounds me. Because so many of my illustrations for picture books are science and nature related, research is essential for an accurate finished piece. My art grows richer because of what I learn and understand about my subjects. -
Frozen Shrub, Harrington Beach State Park - Max Cozzi
February through May 2016 - Riverside Park
From the show "The Wisconsin Natural"These landscape photographs portray the beauty and wonder that the great state of Wisconsin holds within its unaltered environment. From glacial formed hills and moraines, mazes of lakes and woods, to the dynamic and ever-changing shorelines of the great lakes, the natural beauty of Wisconsin is pure and full of magnificence. -
Underworld - Cynthia Brinich-Langlois
January through March 2016 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "Wood and Stone"The lithographic prints tell a story that begins on the tundra, with the drying up of rivers and ponds, but the series expands to include diverse habitats, and the land itself begins to disintegrate. The work depicts a journey through changing environments, with surreal geographies suggesting an unsettled future. -
Above the Falls - Ken Vonderberg
January through March 2016 - Menomonee Valley
From the show "Wood and Stone" -
Adam Stoner
January through March - Riverside ParkFrom the show "Close Encounters"
Stoner's work is a series of gut-driven travels through unfamiliar landscapes of the soul. Close encounters with the natural world become visual translations of human psyche, the religious impulse, and childhood memories that continue to speak with wordless emotion. -
Forest Floor (A special sculpture exhibit) - Shannon Molter
January through March 2016 - Riverside Park
2015
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River's Path - Barbara Manger
October through December 2015 - Riverside Park
From the show "The Nature of Prints"A river’s pulse and energy, secrets and constant change,lead Manger to explore and convey tangles, apparent disorder,and the river wending its own path of necessity. -
Specimens on Green - Sally Duback
October through December 2015 - Riverside Park
From the show "The Nature of Prints"In making paper from rags, re-using natural materials that have been discarded, Duback’s finished works carry a deep level of meaning. -
Vicki Reed
July through September 2015 - Riverside Park
From the show "Ghost Garden"Ghost Garden is a collection of memories in the form of botanical prints. Plants gathered from Vicki Reed's gardens, and from outings with her elderly patients, were used to create lumen prints - a historical technique of placing leaves and blossoms on photographic paper to produce ghost images of the original plants. -
Kevin Muente
April through June 2015 - Riverside Park
From the show "Sacred Places"Kevin Muente's paintings make the viewer understand that we need to protect as many wild places as possible no matter how big or small. At times the window of the canvas frames and perhaps allows places that are in our own communities to rival images of the greatest national parks. -
Target 36: Forest’s Heart - Michael Kutzer
January through March 2015 - Riverside Park
From the show "Being/Seeing"Michael Kutzer paints one place, Seminary Woods, in its many moods. He is interested in how the working of your eyes, and your ability to focus at multiple distances, affects how and what you see in nature. -
This is Our Heritage - Joyce Winter
January through March 2015 - Riverside Park
From the show "Being/Seeing"A continuing quest into being and seeing. Joyce Winter describes her paintings as a dance on paper using color, texture and space - a process that seems to connect memory and sensory impressions of our relationships with nature.
2014
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Bats Over the River - Timothy Haglund
October through December 2014 - Riverside Park
From the show "The Mysterious, Magical World of Nature at Night"Timothy Haglund is primarily a plein air painter. He works in nature, at night, a time that is unique and not always experienced by outdoor enthusiasts. Nature at night is a magical, mysterious time where one’s awareness of their surroundings is heightened, and one’s presence in the landscape feels noticeably alone. It is a time to come to know the land one exists within. The time, the mood, that stillness is alive in the subtleties of these painted night-scapes. -
Veining - Jamie Bilgo Bruchman
July through September 2014 - Riverside Park
From the show "Intimate Nature"Jamie Bilgo Buchman notices the natural world in our everyday lives and asks questions: where do things come from? How do they work? What does this mean? -
Horicon Marsh: A Day - Kristin Gjerdset
July through September 2014 - Riverside Park
From the show "Intimate Nature"Kristin Gjerdset sees the world underfoot - often overlooked, yet as deserving of reverence as grand scenery. Hers is the world of tiny shrubs and flowers, visited by winged beings and fur-bearing creatures. -
Diversity in Small Parcels - Heather Buechler
April through June 2014 - Riverside Park
From the show "Visual Reflections: Printmaker Collective"By invitation, twelve fine art printmakers were linked with twelve ecologists, to engage in a conversation that inspired visual representations of each ecologist’s story. Bench Press Events organized this exhibit for the World Conference of the Society for Ecological Restoration to encourage further insight into the work of ecological restoration. Featuring the work of Jonas Angelet, Douglas Bosely, Heather Buechler, Kris Broderick, Rhea Ewing, Katie Garth, Tyler Green, Laura Grossett, Kim Hindman, Niki Johnson, Yvette M. Pino, and Jay Wallace. -
Return, Take Over - Katie Garth
April through June 2014 - Riverside Park
From the show "Visual Reflections: Printmaker Collective"By invitation, twelve fine art printmakers were linked with twelve ecologists, to engage in a conversation that inspired visual representations of each ecologist’s story. Bench Press Events organized this exhibit for the World Conference of the Society for Ecological Restoration to encourage further insight into the work of ecological restoration. Featuring the work of Jonas Angelet, Douglas Bosely, Heather Buechler, Kris Broderick, Rhea Ewing, Katie Garth, Tyler Green, Laura Grossett, Kim Hindman, Niki Johnson, Yvette M. Pino, and Jay Wallace. -
"18" Shimmer Series - Kurt Kleman
January through March 2014 - Riverside Park
From the show "Water and Light"Abstraction and intimacy, water and light connect Kurt Kleman’s dramatic large-scale acrylic paintings (“shimmer” series) and Thea Kovac’s vibrant watercolors (“Floating Light” series). You might become mesmerized by our rivers and Lake Michigan all over again. In delightful and engaging counterpoint are bird carvings by Tom Petri. Sara Daleiden, director of MKE <-> LAX will be on hand to host the event as well as moderate the question & answer session with the artists. -
Floating Light Series - Thea Kovac
January through March 2014 - Riverside Park
From the show "Water and Light"Abstraction and intimacy, water and light connect Kurt Kleman’s dramatic large-scale acrylic paintings (“shimmer” series) and Thea Kovac’s vibrant watercolors (“Floating Light” series). You might become mesmerized by our rivers and Lake Michigan all over again. In delightful and engaging counterpoint are bird carvings by Tom Petri. Sara Daleiden, director of MKE <-> LAX will be on hand to host the event as well as moderate the question & answer session with the artists. -
Black-capped Chickadee - Tom Petri
January through March 2014 - Riverside Park
From the show "Water and Light"Abstraction and intimacy, water and light connect Kurt Kleman’s dramatic large-scale acrylic paintings (“shimmer” series) and Thea Kovac’s vibrant watercolors (“Floating Light” series). You might become mesmerized by our rivers and Lake Michigan all over again. In delightful and engaging counterpoint are bird carvings by Tom Petri. Sara Daleiden, director of MKE <-> LAX will be on hand to host the event as well as moderate the question & answer session with the artists.
