Headwaters of Industry

Vermillion presents two artists who study and reinterpret our collective landscape for subjective meaning. Both compare the construct of nature and urban ecosystems with our concept of reality to develop an allegory that draws us into the truth of our own being. Sarah Kavage explores the grand narrative of our country’s settlement, and the effect of that story on our modern worldview. “These paintings are about that point in history where the forest gives way to a city; a tree becomes an industrial product.” Based on logging images by legendary Pacific Northwest photographer Darius Kinsey, Kavage’s oil on salvaged wood paintings combine a symbolic use of color with “found” patterns and visual wit to play with the idea of how an image's meaning changes over time. Erin Morrison negotiates the line between natural and man-made and how our surroundings reflect the way we view ourselves. Influenced by photography, Morrison employs crushed pigment, mixed media and resist techniques to represent realistic, manufactured frameworks with dreamlike overtones. These structures appear to be at their most compromised points of existence.