Detroit-based artists Clinton Snider, Graem Whyte, Michael McGillis, Mitch Cope and Scott Hocking left behind, if only temporarily, the tragedy of Covid in May 2020 to bail out, quite literally, their friend and fellow exhibiting artist, Andrew Krieger, in the midst of another tragedy. When twenty-two billion gallons of water breached Edenville Dam, a piece of Krieger family heritage was badly damaged.
This 100-year pandemic and this 500-year fl ood, while different in scope and scale, cast a heavy weight into each artist’s creative reservoir. While rebuilding Krieger’s historic family ranch, the friends found creative inspiration in the changed landscape from the flood, and the changed world from the pandemic.
Their inspiration, that work, is exhibited here. Oil paintings, mixed media and photographs, among others, tell the story of isolation and devastation, of loneliness and community.
Notes from the Quarantimes: Six Artists. One Pandemic. And, a Dam Flood.
This 100-year pandemic and this 500-year fl ood, while different in scope and scale, cast a heavy weight into each artist’s creative reservoir. While rebuilding Krieger’s historic family ranch, the friends found creative inspiration in the changed landscape from the flood, and the changed world from the pandemic.
Their inspiration, that work, is exhibited here. Oil paintings, mixed media and photographs, among others, tell the story of isolation and devastation, of loneliness and community.
Notes from the Quarantimes: Six Artists. One Pandemic. And, a Dam Flood.
Quarantimes Artists’ Collective Statement:
In our small universe of six artist friends, it felt like the growing scale of the Pandemic opened up a muted intermission from life’s routines. Into that expansive, uncertain space was inserted, of all things, a catastrophic dam failure that occurred just a half-mile upstream from Andrew Krieger’s family cottage on the Tittabawassee River. With those two epic events unfolding simultaneously, we experienced a kind of ‘tragedy vertigo’, confronting the immediate, visceral destruction of a familiar place, while a global tragedy raged in the background. All of it was disorienting, fascinating, and strangely invigorating, as both events invited all levels of reflection, and strengthened existing friendships.
As the Pandemic rolled on with no end in sight, a bond solidified between all of us, tied together by daily, sometimes manic texting as a way of coping with the uncertainty. From the moment the floods took Andy’s family boat house away, their freshly painted adirondack chairs, the beloved pontoon boat and the surrounding landscape our ‘tragedy vertigo’ continued. Magnified by being shut in and isolated throughout 2020 and much of 2021, our lives have become filled with personal follies. Everything from everyday annoyances, some falling under the category of a comedy of errors and others having serious life and death consequences. One of us went through a difficult divorce and another broke his femur, twisting and fracturing the bone which required emergency surgery, titanium screws and supports followed by months of being bedridden. We all experienced the stress and grief of losing friends and family during this time. All aspects of our lives have been challenged and put into question, priorities rearranged, relationships stressed to the breaking point, but together we were able to find comfort in seeing the humor, beauty and meaning within despite the calamity.
The text group we formed during this time allowed us to communicate fluidly, giving us a vehicle for venting while using a great deal of cathartic humor, sarcasm, ultimately filling a basic human need to stay connected. This daily, nearly 24-7 open line of communication became a vital crucial tool for keeping our sanity and in several cases, may have quite literally saved our lives.
The works in this show represent a small window into how we have just barely begun to process the past year and a half as working artists. Having the show at the Marshall Fredericks Sculpture Museum is meaningful for several reasons. The scale, grandeur and commitment Marshall put into his work has been inspiring to all of us. The relationship he had to the human scale, the human condition and how he elevated this condition in many symbolic and literal ways has many parallels to our own recent experiences. The proximity of the Museum near the TIttabawassee river and its tributaries makes having the show here significant in that we have shared experiences and interest in regard to the origins of the flood and how we see ourselves in relation to the regional history as well as Marshall Fredericks’s legacy.
In our small universe of six artist friends, it felt like the growing scale of the Pandemic opened up a muted intermission from life’s routines. Into that expansive, uncertain space was inserted, of all things, a catastrophic dam failure that occurred just a half-mile upstream from Andrew Krieger’s family cottage on the Tittabawassee River. With those two epic events unfolding simultaneously, we experienced a kind of ‘tragedy vertigo’, confronting the immediate, visceral destruction of a familiar place, while a global tragedy raged in the background. All of it was disorienting, fascinating, and strangely invigorating, as both events invited all levels of reflection, and strengthened existing friendships.
As the Pandemic rolled on with no end in sight, a bond solidified between all of us, tied together by daily, sometimes manic texting as a way of coping with the uncertainty. From the moment the floods took Andy’s family boat house away, their freshly painted adirondack chairs, the beloved pontoon boat and the surrounding landscape our ‘tragedy vertigo’ continued. Magnified by being shut in and isolated throughout 2020 and much of 2021, our lives have become filled with personal follies. Everything from everyday annoyances, some falling under the category of a comedy of errors and others having serious life and death consequences. One of us went through a difficult divorce and another broke his femur, twisting and fracturing the bone which required emergency surgery, titanium screws and supports followed by months of being bedridden. We all experienced the stress and grief of losing friends and family during this time. All aspects of our lives have been challenged and put into question, priorities rearranged, relationships stressed to the breaking point, but together we were able to find comfort in seeing the humor, beauty and meaning within despite the calamity.
The text group we formed during this time allowed us to communicate fluidly, giving us a vehicle for venting while using a great deal of cathartic humor, sarcasm, ultimately filling a basic human need to stay connected. This daily, nearly 24-7 open line of communication became a vital crucial tool for keeping our sanity and in several cases, may have quite literally saved our lives.
The works in this show represent a small window into how we have just barely begun to process the past year and a half as working artists. Having the show at the Marshall Fredericks Sculpture Museum is meaningful for several reasons. The scale, grandeur and commitment Marshall put into his work has been inspiring to all of us. The relationship he had to the human scale, the human condition and how he elevated this condition in many symbolic and literal ways has many parallels to our own recent experiences. The proximity of the Museum near the TIttabawassee river and its tributaries makes having the show here significant in that we have shared experiences and interest in regard to the origins of the flood and how we see ourselves in relation to the regional history as well as Marshall Fredericks’s legacy.
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This exhibition is made possible with the support of the MCACA
