BIRTHPLACE:   Spokane Washington LIVES IN:   Santa Barbara WORKS IN:   Santa Barbara

ADDRESS:   908 W. Islay, Santa Barbara, CA 93101 WEBSITE:   http://www.blurb.com/books/430170 TAGS:   sculpture, installation, mixed-media, environmental, Fine, Art

Laura Lynch is an internationally recognized environmental artist currently working in Santa Barbara, California with found objects gathered along the ocean beaches incorporating mixed media and computer generated images. Lynch received her MFA from California Institute of the Arts and completed a yearlong study with New York’s Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Studio Program. She is a past recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts grant, and a participant in the three-year travelling international exhibition, “Toxic Landscapes: U.S. Artists Examine the Environment,” which opened at Rachel Carson Institute at Chatham College Gallery in Pittsburgh PA, in October 2001, as part of the United Nations Women’s Environment & Development Organization planning conference: “Women Assess the State of the Environment (WASTE),” designing an agenda of women’s environmental issues and concerns for the international UN Earth Summit 2002, in Johannesburg, South Africa. “Toxic Landscapes” was also featured at Bibliotéca Nacional José Martí, Main Gallery, Havana, Cuba, in collaboration with Cuban artists during June and July of 2002. “Toxic Landscapes” closed with an exhibition in the U.S. on the east coast in July of 2004 at Long Beach Island Foundation for Arts and Sciences with a special focus on their coastal wetlands project. In June 2005, as part of the United Nation’s selection of San Francisco as the world site for World Environment Day, Lynch participated in a northern California group exhibition, “California Current: State of the Ocean,” a confluence of art and the ocean from British Columbia to Baja addressing environmental concerns in an effort to stimulate awareness of the fragile California coastline. In 2006, Lynch created a site-specific installation of found objects she gathered over a year of sponsored boat trips to the Channel Islands by the Ventura Museum of History & Art and the National Park Service for “Island Passages: Artists Celebrate The Channel Islands,” a group exhibition celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Channel Islands marine sanctuary at the Ventura County Museum of History and Art, Ventura, California. Laura Lynch’s “Pacific Series” was exhibited in two one-person shows, “Rising Tides & Warning Signs: Pacific Series 2006,” traveling to the northern California coast of Point Reyes at Gallery Route One in their Environmental Project Space Gallery: “With the Earth,” March 31 thru May 7, 2006, and then to the Monterey coast, October 1- November 3, 2006, at Monterey Peninsula College Art Gallery.

 

 

Known for her environmental stewardship and fine art background, Laura Lynch’s multi-media constructions, Pacific Series 1996-2008: Environmental Assemblages, are brought together for the first time in this beautifully designed book of more than 70 full-color images illustrating the artist’s powerfully composed body of work that addresses her passion for the state of the ocean and threat to our global environment. Combining washed-up marine salvage and found objects – organic and nonorganic such as sand, tar, and feathers – scavenged along the ocean beaches, Lynch also culls from her stash of extraordinary images creating digital photomontages that are transferred onto colorful beached shipboards, often times with a sense of humor and ironic playfulness. Lynch also paints directly onto her found shipboards collaging images and juxtaposing colors, shapes & textures for the eye to play on. These environmental assemblages are not only painterly but substantive in their historical context and present day imagery, transforming the whole into something greater.

 

68 pages, 75 color illustrations, Hardcover with Dust Jacket, premium paper. Large Format Landscape, 11x13 in.  $94.95

Website for viewing & ordering the book: click on the image of the book above.