For me, one of my favourite things about attending art exhibitions is that you scarcely know what you'll get. Some days you will get drummers and live poetry and other days you will get sunsets and up-cycled shells wrapped in human made shine. I had the opportunity to attend an art exhibit at the Susan Mains Art Gallery on the, 16th March, 2018 that was quite a bit different from ones I've gone to in the past.
In the privileged opportunity I had to speak with the artist Amy Cannestra, I got a first hand encounter with her artistic process and a fine art conversation about the exhibit titled Horizon. We spoke of creativity and awe inspiring moments of life caught, perhaps better worded, framed in pieces of art.
Amy and I spoke of the ease of her creative process as she ventured simply to capture a landscape in an a moment. It's colour, composition, the vibrancy of that moment's every move whether slow and whimsical or passionate and evasive. We conversed of it's ability to steer in you feeling of appreciation, astonishment and respect, all at once. Something she has artificially put to paper in the pieces showcased in Horizon.
Who has not felt that awareness of extraordinary fortunate to be alive to bare witness a scene, so heavy in its tangible beauty, that you can do little but look on in both shock and surprise. When you are afraid to do anything to compromise this moment of being wholly alive in all of your senses. Unable to catalogue it because what if you move and you miss a sliver of brilliance? Surely, that cannot be allowed! Is that a feeling only brought to the surface by Caribbean sunsets?
I don't think so... I know I have felt it just looking at cityscapes too far away too... The point I'm trying to zero in on here is that excitement of total appreciation of beauty not seen the same way by all. A unique perception perhaps, we do not readily acknowledge until we see it represented. Something that art, whether visual, musical, or literary in my experience, always helps us to see faster than if left to our own devices.
Amy and I spoke of how sometimes just the action of bringing the art to life by letting it be simple and real and three dimensional can be it's own artistic voyage. In the exhibition she used acrylic paint on both paper and a plastic over covering, that when left to sit atop each other, created a sense of movement and depth in the painting for the eyes.
Her bright choice of colours made the pieces even more captivating and really how could you look away even if you wanted to do? Amy's use of a horizon line also works to give the eyes a safe harbour upon which to dwell in her pieces, so that the paintings, though bright and full of motion are not completely overbearing for the viewer.
When we spoke of her other pieces, made of conch shell and chocolate wrappers, I could not help consider the relevance to our Caribbean environment. She has taken two pieces of inexpensive material the world deems trash or excess and given them an opportunity to adorn a new purpose of beauty.
The ocean has spit up conch shell and humanity has spit up snack wrappers and these waste materials have been made, through her artistic expression, to sit next to each other. Neutral beside shining tint, in a minimalist expression of second chances due to the visionaries hands. This, is a lesson I continue to enforce however I can as a global citizen; the notion of social responsibility to the lands we inhabit, to see the beauty in the original even in this modern day eminence of the change.
As human beings, with only one planet to our name we must continue to hold to the relevance of the reuse, reduce and recycle approach. Art continues to show us that these concepts extend even to reshape our concept of what is visually appealing. Amy's use of natural materials as an agent that does this simply; it is a small movements that makes a big statement through the vessel of fine art. Her pieces remind us of a commitment to finding too renewed purpose for all that serves us, so that beauty both natural and man made is not lost to us due to hazards caused by us.
It was wonderful to talk with Amy as a fellow artist and to appreciate what a moment and second chance for a piece of material can do to create beautiful things, if we dare to think outside of the norm and to take the risk of working with what we have now. It is a message I hope we pass on to generations, if not through our warnings then through our artistic recordings and representations. Especially, as Caribbean citizens, directly affected by climate change and poor waste management.
This post has been published today in conjunction with the international celebration of World Environmental Awareness Day (June 5) and World Oceans Day, June 8.
Peace. Love. Protect.
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