Shifting Shorelines brings together historic and contemporary art, visual culture, and environmental science to engage the history of human existence, commerce, and industry along the Hudson estuary. Focusing on the river’s edges from Albany southward to its flow into the Atlantic Ocean, the exhibition foregrounds the impact of local industry on the natural environment, highlighting the history of the river’s distinctive ecological features such as brackish and salt marshes, mudflats, and beaches, along with the docks, factories, and buildings that crowded them out. Through visual and material evidence, Shifting Shorelines demonstrates the various cycles of exploitation, damage, and reclamation.

Shifting Shorelines actively engages in a critical dialogue with images of the river as a natural paradise by showing these seemingly hegemonic portrayals alongside contrasting representations that consider the exploitation and environmental damage to the river that has accompanied many of the human endeavors along its shores. In so doing it offers a counter reading of the received art historical narratives—narratives overwhelmingly grounded on the work of white male artists—that aims for a rich and complex understanding of the legacy, life, and livelihoods along the river informed by the voices and experiences of a broad range of creators.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a publication as well as academic and public programming.

ARTISTS IN THE EXHIBITION

Courtney M. Leonard is an artist and filmmaker, who has contributed to the Offshore Art movement. Leonard’s current work embodies the multiple definitions of “breach”, an exploration and documentation of historical ties to water, whale and material sustainability.

In collaboration with national and international museums, cultural institutions, and indigenous communities in North America, New Zealand, Nova Scotia, and the United States Embassies, Leonard’s practice investigates narratives of cultural viability as a reflection of environmental record.

The artist Courtney M. Leonard, a citizen of the Shinnecock Nation of Long Island, explores marine biology, Indigenous food sovereignty, migration, and human environmental impact through visual logbooks that investigate the multiple definitions of the term “breach.”

BREACH: LOGBOOK 24 | STACCATO is the result of a multi-year artist residency initiated by the UMCA in collaboration with the UMass College of Natural Sciences and partially funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. The installation will fill the UMCA’s Main, East and West Galleries. It includes paintings, sculptures, and video exploring the life and kinship ties of Staccato, a North Atlantic Right Whale killed by a ship strike in 1999, whose remains are housed in the UMass Natural History Collections.

BREACH: LOGBOOK 24 | STACCATO was created in partnership with the UMass College of Natural Sciences and is supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, The Office of the Provost, The Class of 1961 Artists’ Residency Fund, the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the UMass Natural History Collections and the UMassFive College Credit Union. Significant research and exhibition contributions came from Kathrine Doyle, staff in the UMass Biology Dept and Vertebrate Collections Manager for the UMass Natural History Collections, Tristram Seidler, Curator of the UMass Herbarium, and Michelle D. Staudinger, Ph.D., UMass Department of Environmental Conservation. Emily Volmar, a UMass undergraduate Natural Resource Conservation major, was a summer Art & Science research assistant for this project. Her work and that of UMass Postdoctoral Researcher Amy Teffer was supported by the Northeast Climate Adaptation Science Center.

View the press release HERE

EVENTS

OPENING RECEPTION:

Randolph W. Bromery Center for the Arts lobby & UMCA, Amherst, MA 01003
umass.edu/umca

Opening Reception & Talk: Wednesday, February 21 | 5:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
Randolph W. Bromery Center for the Arts, 151 Presidents Drive, Amherst MA

Free and Open to All

5:00 p.m. Artist Talk in Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall 
All are invited to hear from artist Courtney M. Leonard in conversation with poet Abigail Chabitnoy, Assistant Professor, UMass MFA program for Poets & Writers, in the Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall.

6:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. Reception in Bromery Lobby and UMCA
Enjoy appetizers in the Bromery Lobby and chat with the artist. Meet the scientific team from the UMass College of Natural Sciences who worked on this multi-year collaboration and visit the exhibition in the museum.

RE-OPENING RECEPTION:

September 19, 5:30-8:30pm

5:00pm Artist Talk in Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall 
UMCA and Bezanson Recital Hall

MORE INFO HERE

UMASS ART & SCIENCE CONVENING with COURTNEY M. LEONARD

Tuesday, November 12, 2024 | 5:30-7:30 pm

Join artist Courtney M. Leonard and a panel of UMass scientists for a thought-provoking discussion on the intersection of art and science. Leonard’s exhibition, BREACH: LOGBOOK 24 | STACCATO, currently on view at the University Museum of Contemporary Art, showcases the results of her collaboration with university researchers.

On Tuesday, November 12, they will delve into their collaborative process and share insights into using art as a powerful tool for scientific research and dialogue, particularly concerning climate change and marine biology.

This event is sponsored by the Women for UMass Grants program, dedicated to advancing initiatives that support students and empower women.

Don’t miss this opportunity to learn about how art can influence pressing environmental issues!

Great Hall, Old Chapel
Amherst, MA

Courtney M. Leonard is an artist and filmmaker, who has contributed to the Offshore Art movement. Leonard’s current work embodies the multiple definitions of “breach”, an exploration and documentation of historical ties to water, whale and material sustainability.

In collaboration with national and international museums, cultural institutions, and indigenous communities in North America, New Zealand, Nova Scotia, and the United States Embassies, Leonard’s practice investigates narratives of cultural viability as a reflection of environmental record.