Solo Exhibition – Dawn Watson’s “Message from GRACE: Imaginings of an Altered World”

Bio

Dawn Watson (http://dawnwatsonphoto.photoshelter.com/index) attended classes at Maine Media Workshop, International Center of Photography and Santa Fe Workshop. Her work is influenced by Elizabeth Avedon, Valerie Carrigan, Cig Harvey, Valerie Jardin and Peter Turnley, among others. Watson currently studies with Sandi Haber-Fifield. Her work is held in private collections and has been shown in juried exhibitions at A Smith Gallery, The Center for Fine Art Photography, The DarkRoom Gallery, The Griffin Museum, Providence Center for Photographic Arts, The Lodge at Woodloch Gallery, New York Center for Photographic Arts, Photoplace Gallery, Tang Museum at Skidmore College, The Tilt Gallery and most recently at the dnj Gallery in Santa Monica, CA where she won First Prize in the LACP Member Exhibition and was awarded a solo exhibition at the Los Angeles Center of Photography this August. Based in Hastings on Hudson, NY, Watson is an advocate for the arts and the environment. She continues her long association as board member of Scenic Hudson Inc., a regional environmental group charged with preserving the Hudson River and environs.

Artist Statement

High above the Atlantic, suspended between time zones and uncertain outcomes, sleep comes fitfully. In the dark, the world shifts. Midnight reading offers a distraction but also deeper evidence for concern. Earth’s axis tilts, gravity pulls, seasons change, ice melts, flooding waters rise, or the earth is left parched, the natural world changes beyond recognition. Human activity contributes to these seismic shifts in Earth’s mass and atmosphere. Heightened awareness of our ever-changing world leaves bodies and spirits under stress from this increased vulnerability. Adapt and change to a new way of being or turn a deaf ear and a blind eye to the comprehensive observations from both elders and science warning of the consequence of denial. “Message from GRACE” offers an inverted reality, present but not yet seen. Delicate details or vast landscapes are familiar yet strange, hold both beauty and decay, alarm and possibilities. How to make sense of our off-kilter politics, environment, relationships? How can we shape our near and distant future?

“NASA’S GRACE Mission satellites, (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment) relay data that has transformed analysis of changes in the Earth’s system. GRACE-FO, scheduled for launch in late 2017, will continue the work of tracking Earth’s water movement to monitor changes in underground water storage, the amount of water in large lakes and rivers, soil moisture, ice sheets and glaciers, and sea level caused by the addition of water to the ocean. These discoveries provide a unique view of Earth’s climate and have far-reaching benefits to society and the world’s population. “https://gracefo.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/overview”

I offer my deep gratitude to juror Paula Tognarelli and the Los Angeles Center of Photography for their dedication to the photographic process and community.

Message from GRACE: Imaginings of an Altered World

“…the places are what remain, are what you can possess, are what is immortal. They become the tangible landscape of memory, the places that made you, and in some way you too become them. They are what you can possess and in the end what possesses you.” Rebecca Solnit, A Field Guide to Getting Lost