Sunday, August 16, 2020

 Sara Garden Armstrong, Threads and Layers at
    The University of Alabama Gallery and The Arts Council Gallery
 of the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center in Tuscaloosa









Monday, September 10, 2018

Marking Landscape 3

Space One Eleven, September 7 - December 28, 2018
Women with their Work III: Materialityco-curated by Peter Prinz and Jessica Dallow, Ph.D. 


Marking Landscape 3, 2018
Size:   9’ h x 11’ w x 10 ’
Materials:   Forms are sprayed with abaca fiber.
Interior light-emitting diodes (LEDs) are controlled by a micro-controller.
The LED runs are programmed with parameters (variable) speeds and numbers of LEDs so it will never be the same each time.
There are eight linear runs varying in size from 17 1/2 feet to 3 1/2 feet.
Electronics and firmware developed by Bob Paradiso of Access Redefined
Assisted by Ryan Waldo with Craig Legg and Tara Stallworth Lee

This site specific landscape is about growth, change, meditation and the never ending shifts of realities that constantly confront us. The forms and color address linear movement with the LEDs moving through space referencing time, sound, and energy. 

The work acts as calligraphy marks throughout the space using transparency, mapping and layering. The LED runs have the same color light yet appear very different because of the length of the runs and the color changes of the forms – referencing our diversity and alikeness. Some shadows are cast on the walls while others are painted - layering another conversation of what is ‘real’ and not real.

Marking Landscape 3, 2018 is an exploration from two previous works using LEDs and my most recent paintings, Murmuring Landscapes series.
Sentient Matrix, 2014: Commissioned by the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, Alabama-Mississippi. An abstraction of the brain where the linear forms symbolize neutrons. A blockage with MS in the brain is referenced when the LEDs turn red and stop. 
Marking Landscape 2, 2017: The LEDs reference sound movement. An image was taken from a wall of sound drawings and translated into three-dimensional drawing of sound moving through space. 
Murmuring Landscapes series, 2018: The paintings use pigmented fiber on canvas as paint. 




Video produced by Carey Fountain, DoReMe Media GroupProduction


Monday, June 11, 2018

Murmuring landscape paintings with video

Murmuring Landscape  3, 4, 5
pigment and fiber on canvas
Each 60" x 48




Exploring the process of painting with pigmented fiber and acrylic stain on canvas and paper.

Sometimes I don't know where it's going, but I know there is going to b a change......





Thursday, June 7, 2018

Fragmented Recall, Sara Garden Armstrong and Barbara Hirschowitz


Ground Floor Contemporary is pleased to present Fragmented Recall, an exhibition featuring new work by Sara Garden Armstrong and Barbara Hirschowitz.  Both artists are working with recollected imagery using chance, change and encounter.

Armstrong is a visual artist who works in a myriad of directions and scales, from atrium sculpture to small artist books. This body of work, Murmuring Landscape paintings and drawings, involves the mirroring of changing organic processes. The concerns of the work are fundamental: control / loss of control, fluidity / presence, and change / exploration.  All rely on the properties of materials as they explore shifts of meaning.  The work uses transparency, mapping, and layering. With the drawings and paintings, this calligraphy forms a language, layering the past and the present.

Hirschowitz is a painter using canvas and paper to visualize her work from a history of living moments. With confident, colorful layers she describes hybrid spaces- an unknown place rendered in a familiar manner, often prompting the viewer to question if they might recognize it from their own past.  Though the element of space has always been present in her work, the current body evokes simplicity and directness.  She describes this work as being one of ambiguity in which a physical encounter is left.


Ground Floor Contemporary is a cooperative art gallery committed to promoting and expanding the visual arts scene in the greater Birmingham area. The gallery space is open to the public from 1pm to 4pm on Sundays and by appointment. It is located at 111 Richard Arrington Jr. Blvd S, Birmingham, AL 35233.