This fun and creative project, Proyecto de Calaveras actually has a serious goal, to raise money to support our local rancheros who were losing dozens of livestock due to severe drought conditions.
My cow skull is designed with turquoise ceramic horns and is crawling with colorful ceramic dermestid beetles, an homage to the beauty of the cycle of life. He does need a name if anyone wants to come up with some creative suggestions!?
There is a Go Fund Me set up if you’d like to donate directly (note donation amounts are in pesos not dollars) or come down to Galeria Mangos in Todos Santos June 14-21, 11am-4pm to bid on a skull decorated by a local artist.
Please check out these talented artists that participated in our first group exhibition Sticks + Stones | Palos + Piedras!
I’m so sad to see this show go, I have loved having every single one of their works in my studio and sculpture garden. Learn more about each artist and their work through the Artists Sharing Artists series.
You can follow them on social media to keep in touch with their creative endeavors! Enjoy and be sure to come see our next exhibit coming this fall!
Sticks + Stones | Palos + Piedras Artists: Christa Assad, Steven Jacobi, Abel Martinez Gonzales, Kevin Wickham, Jenni Ward, Natalia Szalc, Ulises Martinez, Paolo Melandri + Rudy Mendoza.
Coastal Rail Trail’s latest segment opens SANTA CRUZ >> Community members, local leaders and hundreds of Bay View Elementary students packed into La Barranca Park on Bay Street in Santa Cruz Wednesday morning for the official opening ceremony for the Segment 7, Phase II portion of the Coastal Rail Trail. People walk through Santa Cruz artist Jenni Ward’s “Feast of Flowers” as they arrive at Wednesday’s ceremony. Read more…
Led by participating artist Natalia Szalc, the women of the Fungi Nipple Collective brought their orange glow to our slice of desert last Sunday. Complete with dance, soundscapes, poems, films and food and drinks all of which celebrated the connection of women and mycelium. The Fungi Nipple installation is comprised of hundreds of handmade clay forms that seem to be sprouting up in the arroyo. Here’s a few scenes from this pop-up event…
About the project: What do mushrooms and women have in common? They both play a significant role in the creation of life on Earth: populating, nourishing, cultivating, and communicating. Similar to the mycelium network, women serve as facilitators of communication and builders of connections. They pass down valuable knowledge through generations and share supportive information that uplifts one another. The Fungi Nipple ceramic installation is a collaborative effort between myself and a group of women who create these pieces together to form a swarm of Fungi Nipples. The number of pieces reflects the vital role that women play in our world as creators of life and growth. A woman embodies Mother Nature herself, with a sacred connection to the earth and clay. By honoring and respecting the womb, we honor and respect the feminine – embracing the deep, mysterious realms of inner wisdom, feminine power, intuition, and living in harmony with the cycles of birth, growth, decay, death. and rebirth. This installation aims to recognize women as the creators of life and their profound connection to Mother Nature. What better way to establish this connection than through a simple acknowledgment? Acknowledgment can serve as a potent tool for building trust, shifting attitudes, and fostering collaboration. This installation is designed to spark conversations about the power and practice of acknowledgment, aligning ourselves with the essence of Mother Nature. – Natalia Szalc
I can’t believe that I’m actually able to write the title to this blog post but it’s finally true. A Feast of Flowers has officially been installed on the newest section of the Coastal Rail Trail at the corner of California & Bay Streets on the westside of Santa Cruz. Here’s a few process pics of the installation…
day 1 : 3 stems get installedday 1 : 3 stems get installedday 1 : 3 stems get installedday 2: all 6 stems are installedday 2: flower #1 gets transportedday 2: flower #1 gets unloaded onsiteday 2: first flower getting placedday 2: second flower getting placedday 2: third flower placedday 3: fifth flower being placed day 3: last flower leaving the studioday 3: final flower being placed
Once landscaping is complete we’ll get some better shots of the installations but until then, enjoy this photo that was a long time coming.
If you want to read about the whole journey of making these pieces, click here!
About the project: A Feast of Flowers will be six ceramic and steel sculptures inspired by the umbel flower structure of fennel plants. Placed staggered along the sides of the trail and silhouetted against the sky, the installation will create a sense of whimsy and wonder for the thousands of patrons who use the trail as well as bring an awareness to our connection with nature.
My inspiration for this particular installation comes from my exploration of the natural world, and my curiosity about identifying plants, especially the edible ones. As an amateur forager, every hike in the woods has become like a trip to the grocery store for me. Fennels are one of the most recognized edibles that grow in California, available for the taking, yet there is a tendency to not trust the wild plants. This disconnect we humans have with nature, the loss of knowledge about native plants and how that relates to the global issue of food insecurity are all concepts explored with this project.
It is also my hope that whimsical oversized flowers will create a fun and dramatic impact for the area, will draw locals and tourists alike outside to connect with nature, learn about local plants and of course take a moment to stop and smell the flowers.
Nearly 5 years in the making from application to installation, this project is finally coming to a close!
A Feast of Flowers, is going to be installed in the coming days at the entrance to the newest section of the Coastal Rail Trail at the intersection of Bay and California streets on the westside of Santa Cruz. These sculptures have been in my Santa Cruz studio awaiting transplanting for over a year and it’s finally going to happen. I’ll be posting photos as things develop but as of right now, the foundations are poured, the anchor bolts are going in soon and after testing the concrete for strength, we will start transporting the sculptures to the site to install. Keep your fingers crossed that everything goes as planned!
If you want to read about the whole journey of making these pieces, click here!
About the project:A Feast of Flowers will be six ceramic and steel sculptures inspired by the umbel flower structure of fennel plants. Placed staggered along the sides of the trail and silhouetted against the sky, the installation will create a sense of whimsy and wonder for the thousands of patrons who use the trail as well as bring an awareness to our connection with nature.
My inspiration for this particular installation comes from my exploration of the natural world, and my curiosity about identifying plants, especially the edible ones. As an amateur forager, every hike in the woods has become like a trip to the grocery store for me. Fennels are one of the most recognized edibles that grow in California, available for the taking, yet there is a tendency to not trust the wild plants. This disconnect we humans have with nature, the loss of knowledge about native plants and how that relates to the global issue of food insecurity are all concepts explored with this project.
It is also my hope that whimsical oversized flowers will create a fun and dramatic impact for the area, will draw locals and tourists alike outside to connect with nature, learn about local plants and of course take a moment to stop and smell the flowers.
Mil gracias to everyone who came out to celebrate the opening of Sticks + Stones | Palos + Piedras at Earth Art Studio last Saturday! Over 100 visitors walked through the desert exploring the sculptures and a special thank you to all of you who purchased art!
✨And to all the artists- you are truly amazing!! ✨
Missed the event? We have a line up of pop-up events coming up over the next few weeks, or make an appointment to come and get a curator tour of the show!
The online shop now has 9 trinket necklaces in stock! These wearable sculptures are a combination of forged steel parts by sculptor Jamie Abbott and porcelain elements by Jenni Ward, strung on either ball chain or leather cord. They jingle as you move and make a bold statement with any outfit.
For those of you that have been following along on the months long journey of making our main studio gate, I’m excited to share that the gate is up and in place! Nate did a fabulous job fabricating and now I’m starting to add on my art elements to it. Over the course of a full day, I got the majority of the parts installed but the rest of the parts are loaded in the kiln for their final glaze firing. So it will be finished up as soon as those come out of the kiln this weekend. Then we will dismantle the sticks and wire temporary fence we’ve had up for close to a year now! Things take a while to come to fruition around here – a pace that I’m slowly getting used to, and it seems to make the end results even sweeter when they finally do happen!
The ceramic work on the gate panels are from my Bone Series and are typically spaced out more with more negative space in both the ceramic elements and the steel cables that connect them. In this application, I needed the pieces and cables to be densely packed to keep my dogs from jumping through the fence. That’s given me the opportunity to explore a new way of working with a very old series. They become like a taut screen that is solid and obviously not solid at the same time. Of course these installations are all about the shadows, so I’m looking forward to seeing how they change throughout the day.
