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Ten­ant Spot­light: LMC­C’s Arts Cen­ter at Gov­er­nors Island, part 2

Feb 21, 2020 11:41 am

LMCC’s new Arts Cen­ter at Gov­er­nors Island opened its doors in Sep­tem­ber for vis­i­tors to dis­cov­er sprawl­ing gal­leries with stun­ning exhi­bi­tions, a host of free activ­i­ties on Sat­ur­days at the Take Care series, and ample stu­dio space for a cohort of res­i­dent artists, acces­si­ble to the pub­lic dur­ing Open Stu­dios events. The inau­gur­al group of six­teen artists in res­i­dence work across dis­ci­plines includ­ing sculp­ture, pho­tog­ra­phy, writ­ing, quilt­ing, and more. In Novem­ber, we high­light­ed two res­i­dent artists, Avi­va Rah­mani and Hilary Lorenz, explor­ing their prac­tices and how hav­ing stu­dio space at the Arts Cen­ter affects their work. Now, we’re high­light­ing two more artists in res­i­dence, Lize Mogel and Aaron Sug­gs, below. 

Lize Mogel

What projects are you work­ing on at the Arts Cen­ter?
I’m work­ing on a long-term project, Walk­ing the Water­shed, which is about the rela­tion­ship between NYC and the upstate com­mu­ni­ties that our drink­ing water comes from. I’m using dif­fer­ent forms of ​“embod­ied car­tog­ra­phy” to explore how the water sys­tem is a social con­nec­tor. This includes a work­shop in which peo­ple make a ​“human dia­gram” of the water sup­ply, a series of bus tours in the Catskills (where 90% of our water comes from), and a cou­ple of oth­er things in the works that are more instal­la­tion-based and performative. 

What unique oppor­tu­ni­ties or qual­i­ties does the stu­dio space at the Arts Cen­ter offer?
The com­mu­ni­ty of artists, writ­ers, and chore­o­g­ra­phers whom I’ll have the priv­i­lege of work­ing along­side for the next year. Much of ​“Walk­ing the Water­shed” is par­tic­i­pa­to­ry, so I’m excit­ed to invite the pub­lic into the project dur­ing Open Studios. 

How does hav­ing space at the Arts Cen­ter affect your work or process?
My thought process is always affect­ed by my envi­ron­ment. I love the open space of Governor’s Island and the vis­i­ble lay­er­ing of his­to­ry. My work is about the social econ­o­my of water, so it’s been real­ly gen­er­a­tive to walk around the island (espe­cial­ly in the qui­et of the off-sea­son) and look out at the har­bor and think about what it rep­re­sents — com­merce, infra­struc­ture, over­lap­ping ecolo­gies, and the city’s future in the face of cli­mate change. 

Has the Arts Cen­ter or Gov­er­nors Island itself inspired any aspects of your work?
I’ve done some pre­vi­ous research about NYC har­bor and the Hud­son Riv­er, and I have a view of the har­bor from my stu­dio (where I can watch the tides, fer­ries and the occa­sion­al oil barge come and go)…so stay tuned. 

Had you been to Gov­er­nors Island before begin­ning your Arts Cen­ter res­i­den­cy?
Many times! It’s been inter­est­ing to see the changes over the last cou­ple of years. 

Learn more about Lize Mogel on her web­site.

Aaron Sug­gs

What projects are you work­ing on at the Arts Cen­ter?
I am mak­ing a series of pho­tographs using small pin­hole cam­eras that I designed and built from read­i­ly avail­able mate­ri­als like met­al and PVC pipe. Cur­rent­ly, I am tak­ing walks around the island, set­ting up the cam­eras in var­i­ous loca­tions and tak­ing sin­gle images at stops along the way. These images will help me deter­mine the best cam­era place­ment, as I build a pro­pos­al to affix the cam­eras to var­i­ous objects across the island (a flag­pole, a fence, the top of a build­ing). The cam­eras will be secured in place for sev­er­al months in order to cap­ture the shift­ing path of the sun as it cross­es over the hori­zon through­out the sea­sons. I am also gath­er­ing source mate­ri­als by log­ging details, pho­tograph­ing and tak­ing video as I trav­el from Brook­lyn to Gov­er­nors Island, via bike and fer­ry. The chang­ing details that I am cur­rent­ly focused on are weath­er pat­terns, the river’s dai­ly con­di­tions; chang­ing cur­rent and tides as well as the course that the fer­ry takes between Man­hat­tan and Gov­er­nors Island. Each of these ele­ments affect and inform the oth­ers and these var­i­ous forms of doc­u­men­ta­tion will be inte­grat­ed into works that I devel­op through­out my res­i­den­cy at the Arts Center. 

What unique oppor­tu­ni­ties or qual­i­ties does the stu­dio space at the Arts Cen­ter offer?
The sea­son­al nature of the pub­lic pro­gram­ming on Gov­er­nors Island means that the pop­u­la­tion den­si­ty ebbs and flows quite dra­mat­i­cal­ly. Through­out the length of the res­i­den­cy, I am sure this will influ­ence my expe­ri­ence; inter­act­ing with numer­ous vis­i­tors when the island is open, and hav­ing a more qui­et and con­tem­pla­tive expe­ri­ence dur­ing the months that the island is closed. For me, the main­stay of LMCC’s pro­gram is the prox­im­i­ty to the oth­er artists par­tic­i­pat­ing in the res­i­den­cy. Hav­ing such a wide range of prac­tices and per­spec­tives work­ing under one roof makes space for the exchange of ideas and con­cepts between artists. This com­mu­ni­ty aspect cre­ates enlivened cre­ative energy. 

Not to men­tion, the view from the Arts Cen­ter is breath­tak­ing with views of the Stat­ue of Lib­er­ty and the con­flu­ence of the rivers in the har­bor. And from the high­est hill on the island, you can see Brook­lyn, Stat­en Island, and New Jer­sey; which attests to the fusion of the nat­ur­al land­scape nes­tled in the midst of such dense urban life. 

How does hav­ing space at the Arts Cen­ter affect your work or process?
For me, com­mut­ing from Brook­lyn to an island in the mid­dle of New York har­bor is a trans­for­ma­tive expe­ri­ence; I ride my bike from Green­point to low­er Man­hat­tan, then catch the fer­ry and cross the har­bor to get to the island. The com­mute is some­thing that one real­ly has to plan for, con­sid­er­ing access is deter­mined by the fer­ry sched­ule. This time con­straint allows me to focus and pri­or­i­tize the work in the stu­dio in a way that is all-encom­pass­ing. Hav­ing unen­cum­bered access to the out­door space on the island is equal­ly impor­tant to my process, allow­ing my work­time to flow freely between out­doors and indoors; the stu­dio nat­u­ral­ly expands beyond the walls of the Arts Center. 

Has the Arts Cen­ter or Gov­er­nors Island itself inspired any aspects of your work?
Access to Gov­er­nors Island has been a spring­board for the work I am cur­rent­ly mak­ing. My work is close­ly relat­ed to my every­day expe­ri­ences and obser­va­tions, so work­ing at the Arts Cen­ter and on Gov­er­nors Island has become an inte­gral part of my art-mak­ing process. Plac­ing pin­hole cam­eras around the island lit­er­al­ly doc­u­ments the spe­cif­ic light pat­terns relat­ed to the loca­tion of the island and the van­tages of the objects that the cam­eras are attached to. Cross­ing the riv­er every day to the island is allow­ing me to pro­duce a series of videos and still pho­tographs doc­u­ment­ing the water­ways and boat move­ments on my jour­ney to the stu­dio. The land­scape and envi­rons of the island will invari­ably become ele­ments of the body of work that I cre­ate dur­ing my residency. 

Had you been to Gov­er­nors Island before begin­ning your Arts Cen­ter res­i­den­cy?
I have vis­it­ed Gov­er­nors Island numer­ous times over the last sev­er­al years. It has always been an inspir­ing place for me, so being a part of LMCC’s res­i­den­cy pro­gram is an excit­ing oppor­tu­ni­ty. I have not spent time on the island in the off-sea­son, so I am real­ly look­ing for­ward to expe­ri­enc­ing the island in all sea­sons and cap­tur­ing the beau­ty of the place through my work. 

Learn more about Aaron Sug­gs on LMC­C’s website.