Explorations in Southwestern Landscapes and Aesthetics
includes four distinct videos:

Diné Poem, Navajo Blessingway Prayer, spoken by Arlene Nochissy Williams
... Before me it is beautiful, now look upon me!
Behind me it is beautiful, now look upon me!
Below me it is beautiful, now look upon me!
Above me it is beautiful, now look upon me!
All around me it is beautiful, now look upon me!
My speech and soul are beautiful, now look upon me!
All my surroundings are beautiful, now look upon me.

It is thrilling my grandchild, now look upon me!
Holy Ones, as many as there are, now look upon me ...

Mountain Creation Song, preformed by Joe B. Begay
... It is extending upward!
By means of it there is life!
It is extending upward!

Now the Central Mounatain, by means of it there is life!
Now hard goods give it strength and stability,
By means of it there is life!
Now the Mountain reigns supreme!
Now Sa’ah Naagháí by means of it there is life!
Now Bik’eh Hózhó by means of it there is life ...

Diné Weaving: Art in its Natural and Cultural Contexts
Arlene Nofchissey Williams hosts this video and explains the history and aesthetics of Dine weaving. Contemporary weaver Bernita Nez demonstates the process of weaving as a creative art form.

Sense and Essence: Four Views
Paintings by Glen Peterson and Bonny Stauffer, textiles by Diane Gilbert, books by Carol Rawlings. The four of us share a devotion to the natural world, taking much of our inspiration from the American Southwest, whose transparent space and glowing light reveal the play of natural elements and the organic processes of Earth’s surface. As we explore those processes and search out the connections they imply, we often find color the best language for expressing what we discover. The first showing of Sense and Essence took place at the Yavapai College Art Gallery in Prescott in 1999. From the initial stages of planning, we viewed the exhibition as a collaborative process even though each of us worked individually from a personal vision. For three years we met at our various studios to look at work in progress and enjoy good conversations provoked by it. When it came to installing the exhibition, we tried to understand what all the works had to say to each other in order to enhance the relationships among them. Now, in the very different space of the Beasley Gallery and with several new pieces added into the mix, we have delighted in the opportunity to renew our conversations with the works and to discover new connections among them.

Artists’ Statements:

Glen Peterson
My art represents nature. Not the external surface attributes, but the underlying scheme. The abstract fabrication of chemicals, cells, atoms. The dynamic, interactive qualities. Nature’s system of fabricating elements is symbolized by weaving. Interweave. Human production of rugs, blankets, paintings imitates nature. Woven images mirror environmental forms, natural phenomena. Like a woven fabric, blue-paint sky subtly veils the shining, permeating light. Energy. Solid earth-forms reflect this light. Space expands. Mind and body are transformed. Becoming, but not being. Ever changing. Nature is alive, robust. My imagery is spontaneous, unpredictable, surprising. An imitation of nature. And its universal elegance of color.As Mondrian said: "We ought not to look past nature; rather we should look through it; we ought to see more deeply, our vision should be abstract, universal. Then externality will become for us what it really is: the mirror of truth."

Bonny Stauffer
My work changed profoundly when I saw the photos from space of the shimmering and fragile surfaces of the earth. I began to see that the seemingly solid ground I contemplate on my solitary hikes is made up of delicately translucent layers built up over geologic time.
Sitting on a mountainside, I see an earth that tells its history and its future in its arroyos and mountains, its meandering rivers, and its trees growing along sunlit ridges. But now I also know that the same landscape viewed from space reveals its fragile geologic layers, watery surfaces, and vegetation patterns wrapped in a thin layer of atmosphere precariously suspended in the blackness of the universe.
The two viewpoints–the personal one from the trail, and the universal one from space–are a metaphor that expresses the interconnectedness between the seemingly impersonal vastness of nature and our personal experience in it–a shared frailty and a shared beauty.

Diane Gilbert
I strive to express a sense of light and space inspired by nature in all of its forms. A language that is essentially textile using color, texture, pattern, and surface has the potential to create its own sense of light and space. Color is the primary language of expression because it can be both transparent as space and radiant as light in an infinite variety of relationships. In each weaving I try to capture a specific experience. What I strive for and what is revealed through the process is a constant source of astonishment to me.

Carol Rawlings
Making calligraphic books presents a peculiar and intriguing challenge: finding or inventing a meaningful text and then giving this essentially abstract, symbolic element a purely visual expression. It means combining two very different mental activities into one imaginative experience. In one way or another, my books take as their subject the natural world and the joy and gratitude I feel in being part of it. The books are a very small contribution toward encouraging a world view in which human beings see themselves as part of the natural world rather than exploiting it. It is perverse, really, to display books under glass. By definition a book needs an interactive viewer, needs to have its pages turned as it hides and reveals its contents. A strongly visual book develops a rhythm than can be fully experienced only by paging through it. On the other hand, most books are also fragile and quick to suffer wear and tear. I have tried to display the books in the exhibition in a way that suggests their rhythms.