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Artist Dialog Featuring Deborah Kennedy
Project Nexus, de Saisset Museum
Artist Dialog Featuring Deborah Kennedy
Saturday, December 13th · 6 PM (EST)
Virtual Session via Zoom RSVP
Hosted by Women Eco Artists Dialog (WEAD) in partnership with The 109 Gallery
Join us for Nature Speaks: Listening Together, an inspiring exploration of the artwork and poetry of Deborah Kennedy, an internationally recognized artist whose practice bridges ecological thought, public space, and the poetics of interconnectedness.
Lecture Description
Nature Speaks: Listening Together is an exciting exploration of the artwork and poetry of Deborah Kennedy. She will begin with her installation, The Writing on the Wall. Deborah created the last series of large-scale installations on the surface of the Berlin Wall in 1989. This work helped inspire her eco installations, Project Nexus and EarthWise, when she returned to the United States. Then, she will share her illustrated book, Nature Speaks: Art and Poetry for the Earth, as well as new work she is collecting for her second book. While projecting intriguing illustrations, she will read two poems and discuss ecological topics and a model of holistic thinking that can help us move toward a thriving world.
Artist Biography
An artist and author, Deborah Kennedy’s work is presented internationally. Her artwork includes paintings, drawings, installations, and books focusing on ecological and social themes. Her published book, Nature Speaks: Art and Poetry for the Earth, combines her illustrations and poetry and was recognized with the Eric Hoffer and Silver Nautilus poetry book awards.
Also, she is noted for creating four large-scale installations on the Berlin Wall six months before it was torn down. This work has been featured in books and newspapers in Germany and the United States. Her work has been widely reviewed, and she has received numerous grants and awards from Art Councils and museums in California. Kennedy lives in San Jose, California, where she teaches art and poetry workshops. Currently, she is a Creative Ambassador for the City of San Jose, bringing the excitement of creative expression to the lives and public spaces of Santa Clara County residents through her innovative Broadside Art and Poetry Project.
www.deborahkennedyart.com
About the Exhibition:
This event is part of the ongoing Artist & Curatorial Dialog series presented by WEAD and The 109 Gallery, in conjunction with the exhibition
Bodies & Borders: Ecologies of Consent — a collaborative project exploring care, connection, and multispecies consent through the work of women artists worldwide.
View the online exhibition: https://www.weadartists.org/bodies-borders-ecologies-of-consent
Free · RSVP Required
RSVP to give us a heads up on attendance, for more info and zoom link, join us for this engaging conversation.
Eventbrite Link
Poetry Dialog + Open Mic
Poetry Dialog + Open Mic Featuring Artists Shelley White, Deanna Pindell, and Leah Dalton
Thursday, December 11th · 7 PM (EST)
In-Person & Virtual via Zoom RSVP
Hosted by Women Eco Artists Dialog (WEAD) in partnership with The 109 Gallery
Join Artists Shelley White, Deanna Pindell and Leah Dalton in poetry and dialog. Bring your poetry to share. All formats welcomed, “all voices heard”.
Presented virtually through Zoom and in person at The 109 Gallery in Historic Downtown Chickamauga, GA. Leah will be on-site at The 109 Gallery while Shelley and Deanna will share via zoom, we will screen the zoom in the gallery. All participates online or in-person are welcome to share, exchange across borders of cities, states, and countries their poetry.
We will begin the evening hearing from the featured artists and then roll into an open mic format.
About the Artists
Shelley K. White is an artist, activist, public-health professor, and WEAD board member whose practice engages social and environmental injustices, especially in borderland contexts. Her work uses painting, collage, sculpture, poetry and found materials to explore migration, ecology and identity.
Deanna Pindell is a Washington-based eco-artist whose installations, sculpture and public art focus on forest and water-quality issues, indigenous rights, and community-science collaborations. She is featured in the exhibition and serves on WEAD’s exhibitions committee and board.
Leah Dalton is a curator and artist currently serving on WEAD’s exhibitions committee and Board. She is also an exhibiting artist in this series and the curator for this current exhibition. Her broad practice explores eco-feminist themes, community arts and material activism, and ecosexual studies.
About the Exhibition:
This event is part of the ongoing Artist & Curatorial Dialog series presented by WEAD and The 109 Gallery, in conjunction with the exhibition
Bodies & Borders: Ecologies of Consent — a collaborative project exploring care, connection, and multispecies consent through the work of women artists worldwide.
View the online exhibition: https://www.weadartists.org/bodies-borders-ecologies-of-consent
Free · RSVP Required
RSVP to give us a heads up on attendance, for more info and zoom link, join us for this engaging conversation.
Eventbrite Link
Artist Dialog Featuring Anne Yoncha
Artist Dialog Featuring Anne Yoncha
Saturday, December 6th · 6 PM (EST)
Virtual Session via Zoom RSVP
Hosted by Women Eco Artists Dialog (WEAD) in partnership with The 109 Gallery
Join us for this artist talk with interdisciplinary artist Anne Yoncha, whose work merges ecology, sound, and visual language through deep collaboration with nonhuman systems. Drawing from environmental data, biological processes, and field-based research, Yoncha’s practice reveals the living intelligence and agency of landscapes.
About the Artist
Anne Yoncha (US) is an interdisciplinary artist and Associate Professor of Art at Metropolitan State University Denver. Her practice blends ecological science with experimental art, working through bio-data sonification, environmental sensing, and analog processes such as making inks from locally sourced plant matter.
She earned her MFA from the University of Montana and later received a Fulbright Fellowship at the Natural Resources Institute Finland, where she collaborated with restoration scientists on art-science projects in former peat extraction sites. Yoncha’s ongoing research includes work with the HAB (High Altitude Bioprospecting) group to detect airborne microbes through field-based investigations in subarctic Lapland.
Through collaborations with plants, soil organisms, and atmospheric microbes, Yoncha creates visual and sonic compositions that function as “scores,” highlighting nonhuman agency and expanding how ecological systems can be perceived, interpreted, and performed.
About the Exhibition:
This event is part of the ongoing Artist & Curatorial Dialog series presented by WEAD and The 109 Gallery, in conjunction with the exhibition
Bodies & Borders: Ecologies of Consent — a collaborative project exploring care, connection, and multispecies consent through the work of women artists worldwide.
View the online exhibition: https://www.weadartists.org/bodies-borders-ecologies-of-consent
Free · RSVP Required
RSVP to give us a heads up on attendance, for more info and zoom link, join us for this engaging conversation.
Eventbrite Link
Artist Dialog Featuring Michele Brody & Mary White
Artist Dialog Featuring Michele Brody & Mary White
Saturday, November 22nd · 6 PM (EST)
Virtual Session via Zoom Free · RSVP
Hosted by Women Eco Artists Dialog (WEAD) in partnership with The 109 Gallery
Join us for an evening exploring the intersections of ecology, borders, and belonging through the works of Mary White and Michele Brody, two artists whose practices illuminate our shared connections across boundaries of place and identity.
About Michele Brody
Michele Brody is a New York–based mixed-media and environmental artist whose 30-year practice explores ecological systems, material histories, and place-based storytelling. She holds a BA from Sarah Lawrence College and an MFA in Fibers and Material Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Brody’s work has been supported by major grants and residencies including NYFA, NYSCA, the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, the Bronx Council on the Arts, Skowhegan, Headlands Center for the Arts, and Wave Hill. Her installations have been exhibited internationally and across the U.S., with solo shows at the Bronx Museum, LES Tenement Museum, Hudson Guild, and numerous artist-run spaces. She has also completed permanent public art commissions for the MTA and NYC Public Art for Public Schools.
About Mary White
Mary White is a Bay Area sculptor, mixed-media artist, and educator whose work centers on environmental and social justice, community art, and place-making. Her practice bridges art, natural sciences, and ecological perception, often through interdisciplinary and collaborative projects.
Trained in ceramics, glass, and painting, White holds a BFA and MFA from California College of the Arts. She taught for nearly two decades at San Jose State University, led international glass programs, and has worked extensively with communities, scientists, youth, and cultural organizations on public art, environmental installations, and cross-disciplinary projects.
Her work has ranged from leading flood-awareness art collaborations in Colorado to creating glass sculpture commissions, partnering with tribal youth in Louisiana, and serving as a Fulbright Scholar in Dublin. White is currently co-director of WEAD: Women Eco Art Dialog, supporting women’s voices in eco-art through exhibitions, education, and advocacy.
About the Exhibition:
This event is part of the ongoing Artist & Curatorial Dialog series presented by WEAD and The 109 Gallery, in conjunction with the exhibition
Bodies & Borders: Ecologies of Consent — a collaborative project exploring care, connection, and multispecies consent through the work of women artists worldwide.
View the online exhibition: https://www.weadartists.org/bodies-borders-ecologies-of-consent
Free · RSVP Required
RSVP to give us a heads up on attendance, for more info and zoom link, join us for this engaging conversation.
Eventbrite Link
Artist & Curatorial Dialog Featuring Leah Craig
Artist & Curatorial Dialog: Featuring Leah Craig
Friday, November 15 · 6 PM (EST)
Virtual Session via Zoom
Hosted by Women Eco Artists Dialog (WEAD) in partnership with The 109 Gallery
Join us for an intimate online session with interdisciplinary artist and educator Leah Craig, whose work explores the intersections of ecology, care, and collective memory through installation, drawing, and fiber-based practice.
Leah’s art engages public space, representation, and environmental justice — creating participatory, site-specific works that invite reflection and dialogue. Her poetic approach to material and place considers how stories are held within landscapes and how art can restore our sense of connection and reciprocity.
About Leah Craig:
www.leahelizabethcraig.com
About the Exhibition:
This event is part of the ongoing Artist & Curatorial Dialog series presented by WEAD and The 109 Gallery, in conjunction with the exhibition
Bodies & Borders: Ecologies of Consent — a collaborative project exploring care, connection, and multispecies consent through the work of women artists worldwide.
View the online exhibition: https://www.weadartists.org/bodies-borders-ecologies-of-consent
Free · RSVP Required
RSVP to give us a heads up on attendance, for more info and zoom link, join us for this engaging conversation.
Eventbrite Link
Performative Reading + Artist Talk Featuring Ruth Wallen
Performative Reading + Artist Talk Featuring Ruth Wallen
My Stained Hands: The Stickiness of Touch
Thursday, November 13th · 7 PM (EST)
Virtual Session via Zoom Free · RSVP
Hosted by Women Eco Artists Dialog (WEAD) in partnership with The 109 Gallery
Join us for an intimate evening of poetic & creative dialog with Ruth Wallen (www.ruthwallen.net), presented virtually through Zoom and in person at The 109 Gallery in Historic Downtown Chickamauga, GA.
Ruth will share intimate conversations with a girdled tree, whose bark has been circumferentially removed as part of an effort to prevent forest fires. Through these exchanges she will reflect on how to touch and be touched by a tree in the forest, the power of fire, the legacy of settler colonialism, and the ongoing ecological degradation of our times.
Artist's Biography
Ruth Wallen, www.ruthwallen.net, is a multi-media artist and writer whose work is dedicated to encouraging dialogue around ecological and social justice. For over a decade she has been bearing witness with trees dying because of urbanization, globalization, in the form of introduced species, and climate change in all its guises, including drought, bark beetles and fire.
📍 In-Person Experience:
Guests at The 109 Gallery will join the live Zoom session from the gallery space, allowing them to listen, ask questions, and engage directly in the conversation with Ruth and virtual participants. After the talk, the group will share additional poetry and reflections inspired by Ruth's work and our local community voices. Arrive a little before 7pm EST to get settled in. Leah Dalton will begin th evening with a poem, and then the atist talk will begin promptly at 7pm.
💻 Virtual Experience:
Online attendees will join via Zoom for Ruth's full presentation and group discussion, connecting in real time with both Ruth and the in-person audience.
About the Exhibition:
Bodies and Borders: Ecologies of Consent explores care, connection, and multispecies consent through the work of women artists worldwide. Presented by WEAD, the full exhibition is viewable online, with select works featured in person at The 109 Gallery.
RSVP & Details
Eventbrite Link
Walk-ins welcome at the gallery.
Film Screening + Artist Talk Featuring Annie Sprinkle & Beth Stephens
On Thursday, Nov 6 we’re screening Playing with Fire: An Ecosexual Emergency (in person only) at 7 pm EST, followed by a virtual artist talk + Q&A at 8:30 pm EST with the filmmakers Beth Stephens & Annie Sprinkle (hosted by The 109 Gallery + WEAD). In-person guests will stay in the gallery and join the Zoom projection so everyone can be in the same conversation.
Share along. It’s a strong fit for those interested in performance art, ecology, queer community topics, and broad community audiences curious about a playful approach to ecological and socio-political activism.
Event at a glance
Thurs, Nov 6
7:00 pm EST – Film screening at The 109 Gallery (in person only)
8:30 pm EST – WEAD-hosted Zoom artist talk + Q&A (in person + virtual)
RSVP (in person or virtual): Link to RSVP Zoom Link
Arrive a little early 20-10 mins before 7pm to get settled in. The 109 will provide light refreshments you are welcome to bring your favorite snacks or beverages. Setting is a warm communal vibe, with a variety of seating options including soft chairs, stools, wooden chairs, floor sitting with blankets and cushions. This is an 18+ event
Presented in collaboration with The 109 Gallery & Women Eco Artists Dialog (WEAD) www.weadartists.org
This event is part of our current exhibition Bodies and Borders: Ecologies of Consent featured online as well as select works being shown at The 109 Gallery.
Check out our gallery online here and read more about the exhibition on our exhibitions page.
WEAD and Gallery 109 are delighted to welcome
Beth Stephens and Annie Sprinkle
Originators of the 'Ecosex' Movement
"Ecosexuality is a conceptual art innovation that we have developed since 2008. It shifts the metaphor from "Earth as Mother" to "Earth as Lover" to inspire a more reciprocal relationship between humans and the non-human realms. By incorporating this concept into our films, we engage our viewers' imaginations, add humor, and celebrate the Earth’s delights to draw meaningful attention to urgent environmental justice issues."
-Beth Stephens & Annie Sprinkle
About The Film
Beth Stephens & Annie Sprinkle directed this joyous ecosexual documentary born from the ashes of California’s devastating fires. When lightning ignites the redwood forest surrounding their home in Boulder Creek, longtime lovers Beth Stephens and Annie Sprinkle are forced to evacuate —and their lives are forever transformed.
Blending loss and grief with art, humor, and community care, the film unfolds through an ecosexual lens (imagining the Earth as a lover) while weaving stories from formerly incarcerated firefighters, an Indigenous scholar, fire artists, neighbors, a witchtherapist, a fire-play massage fetishist, and a fire tassel twirling burlesque queen.
Playing with Fire explores how climate catastrophe intersects with social justice, and is a powerful portrait of resilience in the face of a world in flames. It becomes a love letter to resilience, queerness, and the Earth as the couple navigates trauma, social fires, and climate crisis. Can we learn to live with fire instead of fighting it? This mythopoetic doc film dares to imagine a future aflame with love.
https://sprinklestephens.ucsc.edu/playing-with-fire-2/
Poetry Reading + Films + Dialog Featuring Petra Kuppers
Poetry Reading + Films + Dialog: Featuring Petra Kuppers
Thursday, October 30 · 7 PM EST
Hosted by Women Eco Artists Dialog (WEAD) + The 109 Gallery
Hybrid Event · Virtual + In-Person
Join us for an evening of poetry, film, and conversation with artist and disability culture activist Petra Kuppers (@petra.kuppers). Presented by WEAD and The 109 Gallery, this hybrid gathering bridges art, ecology, and embodiment, part of the exhibition Bodies & Borders: Ecologies of Consent.
Learn more about Petra: https://www.petrakuppers.com/home
Event Flow
In-Person Guests – gather at The 109 Gallery in Historic Downtown Chickamauga, GA for an evening of shared viewing of Petra's reading via zoom and to view her film projected in the gallery, poetry, and dialog. Light refreshments will be provided, come as you are, and feel free to bring a favorite snack (and a friend or two).
Virtual Attendees – join us via Zoom for Petra’s live talk, poetry readings, and open community discussion moderated from the gallery.
RSVP & Details
Eventbrite link → https://www.eventbrite.com/.../poetry-reading-films...
Walk-ins welcome
Explore the Exhibition Catalog – view Bodies & Borders: Ecologies of Consent online: artspaces.kunstmatrix.com/exhibition/14593182/catalog