“Our work begins when we perceive an anomaly in the environment that is the result of opposing beliefs or contradictory metaphors. Moments when reality no longer appears seamless and the cost of belief has become outrageous offer the opportunity to create new spaces — first in the mind and thereafter in everyday life.” — The Harrisons (1987)
VSF is pleased to present the gallery’s first solo exhibition with Helen Mayer Harrison (1929–2018) and Newton Harrison (b. 1932), progenitors of the Ecological Art movement initiated in the late 1960s. The first gallery survey of five decades of pioneering work produced by this husband-and-wife artist partnership known as “The Harrisons”, this exhibition focuses on works that address ecological issues within the artists’ home state of California.
Since 1969, The Harrisons have collaborated with biologists, engineers, architects, urban planners and governments around the world to catalyze social, political and ecological problem-solving through a range of visual art modalities including minimalist sculpture, land art, color field painting, cartography, and video. The Harrisons’ art practice is fundamentally and uniquely interdisciplinary; they are historians, diplomats, ecologists, investigators, emissaries and art activists, proposing radical solutions and instigating public discourse, and often producing elaborate documentation of their proposals. Past projects have focused on urgent ecological threats and opportunities such as watershed restoration, climate change, urban renewal, agriculture and deforestation.
In the courtyard is Notations of the Ecosystem of the Cargill Salt Works with the Inclusion of Brine Shrimp, 2017, a new variation of a historically significant installation known as Brine Shrimp Farm #2, first presented in 1971 as part of LACMA’s landmark Art + Technology exhibition.
