THE EDGE KNOWS; THE ROCK IS

I am pleased to announce the opening of our exhibit

THE EDGE KNOWS THE ROCK IS

At Hammerfriar Gallery on FEBRUARY 1st, 4 - 7

Featuring the artwork of

Brooke Holve & Catherine Richardson

Catherine and I have been collaborating now for several years traveling to Iceland and Ireland for residencies where we were both inspired by the raw and natural energies of the landscape. Our experiences at these residencies sparked many conversations throughout our collaboration. Conversations between us, between our work and about the actively changing landscapes around us. We observed and discussed the natural processes that shape a region, the unfinished nature of landscapes, and our unique practices of making, unmaking, remaking. Above all, we focused on process over immutable form. This exhibition reflects the essence of these ongoing conversations.

Mark your calendars and we hope to see you there!

The Art of Materials Panel Discussion

I will be participating on a panel discussion for The Art of Materials exhibition on Sunday, June 9th from 1:00 - 2:30pm. It will be held at the Petaluma Arts Center, 230 Lakeville Street in Petaluma. A selection of participating artists in the current exhibition will discuss what drives their art-making process and how their choice of material defines their work. Please come by to hear from the artists and see the exhibit if you haven’t yet had a chance.

There was an article written up on the exhibit in the Petaluma Argus Courier on May 15, 2024. Check out: https://www.petaluma360.com/article/entertainment/rock-wood-tools-art-david-best/?utm_source=article_share&utm_medium=copy-link

By Measure 1 - 5. 5 mixed media constructions: book covers, book board & book cloth on birch panels. Each 13 x 5.66 x 2.5 inches. 2015.

The Art of Materials

This exhibition brings together artists who are working with paper, fabric, industrial felt, metal, steel, cement, clay, plastic, cork and wood. Some of the artists combine disparate materials that embody imaginative content or reuse materials that create symbolic forms. Others opt for a single material that gives full voice to their artistic expression. The Art of Materials exhibition has two major questions which are the central topic of consideration: why an artist chooses the material used in their artwork and how the selection of that material reflects what the artist wants to say.

Many thanks to the curators Vicky Kumpfer and Lisa Lightman for putting together this exhibition. I am honored to be a part of it.

Opening Reception is Thursday, May 9, 5:30 - 7:30.

I will be participating on the panel discussion for the Art of Materials exhibit on

Sunday, June 9 from 1 - 2:30

Codex IX International Book Fair

Ath’wart Press will be at CODEX book fair at TABLE #155. Come visit and see my latest artist books as well as collaborative works with poet/artist judi goldberg under the imprimatur of Off Press.

Come for crumples & tea with conversations!

February 4 - 7, 2024

Henry J Kaiser Convention Center

10 10th Street Oakland, CA 94607

For more information about Codex: www.codexfoundation.org

Artist Residency in Eastern Iceland

Off to Iceland last September for a month long artist residency at Skaftfell Center for Visual Art, located on a fjord in the small fishing village of Seydisfjordur. My fifth visit to the island as there is something about the elemental shapes and energies that continue to draw me back to its natural wonders of volcanoes, rift zones and young landscapes visibly being reshaped.

I return to feel its energies and rhythms, to experience its vastness and to open me to possibilities and conversations with and of the landscape.

Conversations with, of and off:

Evidence of the landscape organizing itself—reshaping itself in human time. The eruption site of the Meradalir Volcano on the Reykjanes Peninsula in August of 2022.

Two years ago in December of 2020, Seydisfjordur experienced an average year’s rainfall over a period of 10 days. Major landslides destroyed 13 buildings.

Now, two years later, evidence of the landslides remain.

displacement, dislocation, movement, shaping, change?

A water process that shapes the landscape

During my stay, I experienced a red alert storm with winds up to 60 m per second. Evidence of the power of the winds (below); a historic pier house built around 1900 by a Norwegian entrepreneur was lost, collapsing on itself.

There’s no everything; everything is always moving as the landscape (natural and human—made) interacts with the natural processes of wind, water and soil.

Dissolving boundaries between art and nature; merging art and earth natural processes. Video by Brooke Holve & Eve Chartrand created during the artist residency at Skaftfell Center for Visual Art.

20222023

It will become
what it becomes
when_____decide to
to let it
be be what it is is
as is is as

H AP PY HOL ID AY S!

Back News off 2022 to come in 2023:

1. Recent artist residency in Seydisfjordur, Iceland last September
2. A Box Off Articles (or A MANIFESTO))

back to iceland

After four years since my last visit to Iceland when I taught a workshop at Gullkistan Center For Creativity, I am off to Iceland again. This time I will visit the east coast for a month long residency at Skaftfell - Center for Visual Art located on a fjord in the small fishing village of Seydisfjordur. I am meeting up with Catherine Richardson to resume our collaboration on extraction that had culminated in the exhibit, Materiality Re_Mined at the Seager Gray Gallery in Mill Valley in 2021.

Excited to be returning to a land of volcanoes, rift zones and landscapes that in real time are visibly shaping. Look for my posts on my instagram feed (holvebrooke) and blog at www.brookeholve.com during the month of September.

Pulp: Paper & Book Arts Exhibition in Sebastopol

I will be showing an installation in the

Pulp: Paper & Book Arts exhibition

July 30th - September 4th

at the Sebastopol Center For the Arts

I hope to see you there at the reception this coming

Saturday, July 30th 2 - 4 pm.

Sebastopol Center For The Arts
282 High Street
Sebastopol, CA 95472
Gallery Hours: Thurs - Sunday 10 - 4pm

ath'wart press at CODEX VIII

CODEX VIII International Book Fair: April 10th through 13th at the Craneway Pavilion in Richmond

REMINDER:
I will be exhibiting artist books
under the imprimatur of
ath’wart press at TABLE 26.

What you might like to know about ath’wart press here and more at https://www.brookeholve.com/athwart-press:

ath’wart and “resistance”
—what role it plays in my art practice
—when I feel it, how I respond
—Do I react to or hold the feeling?
—Do I have other words to describe this experience? ie. willfulness, frustration, steadfastness, others?

Recently I read Roni Horn’s latest book, Island Zombie, Iceland Writings. She devoted an entire chapter to “weather reports”. We have our own internal weather reports, which for me the “resistance” front often shows up and passes through. I found her words insightful: ”The weather’s like that. If you don’t fight it, you become one with it and vanish. You cease to exist if you don’t show resistance and cunning. Some people are said to have an eye for the weather but that goes hand in hand with having an eye for life in general. They’re doubtless better hunters and fishermen and notice more things in nature.”

Resistance shapes. And it was an act of resistance that introduced me to art.

An ath'wart story:
I did not set out to be an artist and it took me awhile to proclaim that I was. My father planted the seed although at the time I did not realize it and he never did. Driving by an abstract sculpture one day he exclaimed “Why would anyone make something like that!” Internally I remember questioning   “Why would anyone make something like that?”
Little did I know at the time, that turning a statement into a question was an act of transgression and the beginning of a life as an artist. Questioning opened a way.

The Or Not - An example of an art project that would not have happened if I had not encountered the “resistance” front. Ath’wart honors the role of mistakes and the opportunities offered while working. Artist Books (extracted from The Way Things Are catalogs) will be on display at Codex VIII, Table 26.

Another ath’wart story:

Eric Johnson, founding and former director of North Bay Letterpress Arts, had an exchange with his #2 son, Dino recently. His son occasionally sends him nonsense compositions. He recently sent a two-liner picking up on the oddness of one of my favorite words.

I once fought athwart
I lost

To this Eric responded:

We had a funny moment in the shop four years ago when Brooke Holve encountered a word in a text she was studying and called out to those of us in the room: “guys, what does ATH-wart mean? We tactfully explained that it was pronounced with accent on the other syllable and that it meant across the main direction etc etc. She had the reaction that it was very funny how wrong she had been and how ignorant. From that day on, she invented ATH-wart Press…it’s all explained on that web page.

To which Dino replied:

Ha! She athwarted athwart! They said it couldn’t be done.

Just for that, a bonus, no charge, dedicated to Holve Athwart:

Greed peels sweet needle skin

Up yup hip dippy rub grape space in ripped up crumb humps?

Like you said

CODEX VIII INTERNATIONAL BOOK FAIR

I will be showing my artist books once again
at the CODEX INTERNATIONAL BOOK FAIR
under the imprimatur of
ath’wart press*.

Come Visit Me: TABLE 26

DATES: April 10 - 13, 2022

LOCATION: Craneway Pavilion 1414 Harbour Way So. Richmond, CA 94804

HOURS: Sunday, April 10 12:30 pm - 5:30 pm
Monday, April 11 12:30 pm - 6:00 pm
Tuesday, April 12 12:30 pm - 6:00 pm
Wed, April 13 10:00 am - 3:00 pm

PROGRAM: Information at https://www.codexfoundation.org

ADMISSION TICKETS: Multi Day $35.00; Single Day $15.00; Student (w/ID) $10.00

• More about ATH’WART in the blog post following.

Three years ago at CODEX VII, 2019.

The artist books to be featured at the fair were part of two installations on the topic of extraction exhibited last year at the Seager Gray Gallery in Mill Valley and North Bay Letterpress Arts in Sebastopol.

Catalogs of the installations below: