The Artist in Residence Program at San Francisco's Dump Announces 2010 Residency Recipients and Open Hours for the Environmental Learning Center

Recology San Francisco, formerly SF Recycling and Disposal, is pleased to announce the 2010 Artist in Residence recipients. The eight selected artists are Ben Burke, Joshua Short, Val Britton, Zachary Royer Scholz, Suzanne Husky, Ferris Plock, Bill Russell, and Niki Ulehla. Recology will also open its Environmental Learning Center to the public on Fridays from 1-3pm. The Center is located at Recology's Facility at 401 Tunnel Ave.

The Artist in Residence Program at Recology San Francisco is a one-of-a-kind program started in 1990 to encourage people to conserve natural resources and to promote new ways of thinking about art and the environment. Artists work for four months in an on-site studio space, and use materials recovered from the Public Disposal and Recycling Facility. Over eighty professional Bay Area artists have completed residencies; applications are accepted annually in August. www.recology.com/AIR

The Environmental Learning Center houses a resource center, classroom, and a gallery. The Center is now open on Fridays from 1-3pm where the public can view videos in the classroom and see artwork made by former Recology artists-in-residence in the Environmental Learning Center Gallery. The public will also have access to the Environmental Resource Center, which provides books, teacher resources, and other materials regarding conservation and recycling.

Residency: February 1, 2010 - May 31, 2010
Art Show: Friday, May 14 & Saturday, May 15, 2010

Benjamin Burke combines installation, puppetry, and live performance to present theatrical events informed by fables and vaudeville. In 2008 he participated in Swimming Cities of the Switchback Sea, where he helped create seven boats made from reclaimed materials and modified car engines. The boats served as moving stages for his hour-long play which was performed as the vessels sailed 120 miles down the Hudson River from Troy, New York to Manhattan.
www.apocalypsepuppet.com

Joshua Short creates works that explore popular myths and rituals in American culture. Past projects have looked at archetypes such as the “American Warrior,” and have investigated phenomena such as biker culture and muscle cars. Through installation, video, and often involving the participation of gallery visitors, the works prompt thought about our individual and collective relationships to these mainstays of American life.
www.joshuashort.com

Residency: June 1, 2010 - September 30, 2010
Art Show: Friday, September 17 & Saturday, September 18, 2010

Val Britton makes immersive collaged drawings that come from the language of maps. Using paint, hand-cut paper and printmaking techniques, her large-scale mix-media works relate to her exploration of the routes and roads her father traversed as a long-haul truck driver. Britton is particularly interested in using found paper to create pieces verging on three- dimensionality during her residency at Recology. “I am interested in the tactile qualities and sculptural potential of paper…(and) am intrigued by the tension in transforming recycled materials that can have a nostalgic quality into the otherworldly, imaginary landscapes I make.”www.valbritton.com

As a sculptor, Zachary Royer Scholz works with previously existing materials, deconstructing then reconstructing an object to push it into unexpected directions. Describing his work as a collaboration with the object, Scholz’s art can be completely familiar, yet strangely foreign. Scholz hopes to work with personal materials such as furniture and clothing during his residency at Recology, retaining some of the emotional memories that we associate with these original objects, while creating new forms.
www.zacharyscholz.com

Residency: October 1, 2010 - January 31, 2011
Art Show: Friday, January 21 & Saturday, January 22, 2011

Problematics relating to the exploitation of natural resources, landscape use, and globalization are at the core of Suzanne Husky's multimedia practice. Her installations, akin to large-format dioramas, have depicted the assembly lines of a factory in China, and her forest of trees made from recycled fabric is currently on view at the de Young Museum. Husky is a French American visual artist who has been living and working in the Bay Area since 2000.
www.suzannehusky.com

Fantastic creatures, crazy contraptions, animals as humans, and imagery drawn from world mythology and fairytales are some of the elements that come together in Ferris Plock’s work. Plock draws heavily on a passion for storytelling that he developed during childhood, and his detailed drawings and paintings are often executed on found materials such as children’s blocks and door panels.
www.ferrisplock.com

As a visual journalist Bill Russell tells peoples’ stories through drawings and illustrated text. His residency at Recology will be unique—he will not be working directly with reclaimed materials, but instead will construct a narrative about recycling as told by the people that work for the organization. Russell has been a staff artist at the San Francisco Chronicle , and has drawn and written about people such as chefs and cab drivers and their relationships to their jobs. He is currently working on a book about Civil War re-enactors. www.profilereportage.com

Residency: February 1, 2010 - May 31, 2010
Art Show to be determined

Niki Ulehla is a goldsmith, puppeteer, and puppet maker. For her residency Ulehla will be building puppets, culminating in a  theatrical performance based on Dante’s Inferno. Ulehla  has studied puppetry in the Czech Republic, and frequently leads puppetry workshops for Bay Area high school and middle school students.
www.nikiulehla.com