Stewarding our Water Resources: Solano Artists Create, Collaborate, and Educate

Arts Benicia received a 2023-2024 Creative Corp Capital Region Grant, funded in part by the California Arts Council and the Sacramento Office of Arts & Culture. The grant focused on the southern quartile of Solano County: Benicia, Vallejo, Fairfield, and Suisun. Rio Vista was also included in the first exhibition. Our media campaign featured original artworks and educational exhibitions across Solano County, including displays on SolTrans regional buses. Our creative process included six focused meetings:

October 17 – kick off meeting with the artists (listening session) via Zoom
Sunday, December 17 – Mary Shaw at SWS exhibit to meet and talk with artists
December 18 – 2nd listening session with the artists (via Zoom)
January 21 – artists invited to meet in person with Celeste (8 artists did) to discuss the process and artwork
March 18 – in person meeting with all the artists (ten attended)
August 22 – in person “celebration” and review of project with all artists (9 attended)

 

Solano Water Stories Kickoff Exhibition

Location: Arts Benicia, Showcase Gallery Commanding Officer’s Quarters
1 Commandant’s Lane, Benicia, CA 94510
November 18 – December 17, 2023
Opening Reception: Saturday, November 18, 4 – 6 pm
Free and open to the public.

 

 

Solano Water Stories Kickoff Exhibition presented the history of water, water conservation, and climate change mitigation practices in Solano County. Designed for all ages, it included information about indigenous history, Solano County history, and current urban, rural and agricultural land and water use as well as ongoing conservation practices. It featured a pop-up library and reading room, original artworks, personal water stories, a poetry corner, watershed maps, water distribution maps, videos focused on site specific water education, sustainable gardening, permaculture, and photographs of protected species and their habitats in Solano County. Additional information was gathered from our partner organizations: Sustainable Solano, Solano Resource Conservation District, Solano Land Trust, and the Solano County Water Agency.

Shaw’s intention with this first exhibition was to facilitate a deeper understanding of the climate problems facing the upcoming generation in Solano County and the solutions that may already be partly in place, upon which they can improve. Solano Water Stories focused on Solano County water conservation in the face of climate change and promoted community engagement, sparking hopeful discussion about our sustainable future.

Mary W. Shaw, Curator, Exhibition Design
Shaw is a studio artist, exhibition designer and arts and environmental educator, was identified to work on this project because of her previous work on an exhibition on the history of water and water issues and for her extensive exhibition design experience. She has many years of art education experience with adults, children, and teens in the public schools and over 20 years of experience working in the nonprofit sector, developing successful education and volunteer programs. She created an educational display on the history of water and water issues in Solano County and was the liaison with Sustainable Solano, Solano Land Trust. Solano Resource Conservation District and the Solano County Water Agency. Mary Shaw Tells Solano Water Stories

Click on the links below for partner information and for additional content from the Solano Water Stories kickoff exhibition.

Artists in the Solano Water Stories Kickoff Exhibition 

Akiko Suzuki
Lawrence H. Buford
Janet Barnes
Jean Purnell
Mark Brest van Kempen

Solano Water Stories Kickoff Exhibition Walk-through Video:

Video and Partner Links:

Sustainable Solano
Contact: Allison Nagel
Co-executive Director

Supporting Community Gardens
Elements Of a Food Forest Garden
Creating a Drought Resilient Oasis with Soilogical
Designing with Nature, an Introduction to Permaculture with Michael Wedgely of Soilogical

 

Solano RCD
Contact: Sarah McKibbin
Resource Conservation Project Manager

Watershed Explorers Field Trip
Creek Biomonitoring Program for High Schools

 

Solano Land Trust
Contact: Samuel Adams
Communications Specialist

 

Farm to Community Food Program during the Covid Pandemic
Patwino Worrtla Kodoi Dihi Open Space
​Jepson Prairie Vernal Pool Landscape from Bay Nature Magazine
Rush Ranch
Lynch Canyon
King-Swett Ranch
Farmers of Solano County

 

Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation
(Patwino Worrtla Kodoi Dihi Open Space)

The Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation is a sovereign nation. The people have lived on lands today known as Yolo, Solano, Colusa, Lake and Napa Counties. Our informational content about the Yoche Dehe Wintun Ntion was through our association with Solano Land Trust. Arts Benicia’s Land Acknowledgement

 

 

 

SCWA
Contact: Elise Shtayyeh
Associate Water Resources Specialist

 

Water Efficiency Programs, including:

• • Rebates and programs to help you save
  • Water-wise tips
  • Events and workshops
  • Resources for schools, including the Water Awareness Video Contest

SOLANO COUNTY WATERSHED MAP

Water Distribution Systems:   North Bay Aqueduct   The Solano Project

 

Fairfield-Suisun Sewer District
Contact: Emily Corwin
Senior Environmental Engineer
Solano Stormwater Alliance Manager

Educational Programs and Public Outreach
Resilient and Green Master Plan
Fairfield Coastal Cleanup 2023

 

Casa Education Foundation – California Association Of Sanitation Agencies

 

 

Scholarship Program
Andrea Solis Internship

 

FILM: WIND, WATER, LAND directed by John Beck was commissioned by the City of Benicia in 2015. The artwork in the film was not part of this Creative Corps grant but Shaw included it in the Kickoff Exhibition because it is a great example of  the way artists worked together to create a public artwork about sustainability specifically in Benicia, a well-known artist community. Benicia Herald article.

More Solano Water Stories 

• Benicia Magazine Fall Issue: Patwino Worrtla Kodoi Dihi Open Space by Alexa Manning
• GAS Well Finder (search = solano) There are hundreds of gas wells in south and southeastern Solano county (part of the Northern District Wells): GIS mapping shows active gas wells, plugged wells, orphaned wells  (abandoned!) and permits for new wells. Source: California Department of Conservation, updated daily.
• FEMA Flood Hazard Maps (ArcGIS- downloadable and printable) (Search = by City)
• Solano County Household Water Well & Septic System Loan/Grant Programs
• Solano County Drought and Fire Risk
• Solano County Climate Action Plan
• What’s Under Lake Berryessa Lake Berryessa supplies much of the water in Solano County. See the Solano Project.
• Solano County Faces a 75% water cut under Bay-Delta Plan
• East Solano Plan (Formerly California Forever): Flannery & Associates Tech Investor Group Land Purchase/Proposed Utopian City
• A Changing Landscape by Aiden Mayhood, (Rio Vista native)
• Solano Together: Grassroots Coalition bringing together Democrats and Republicans, farmers, and environmentalists, smart growth advocates, and real estate developers as well as the Audubon Society, Greenbelt Alliance, and the Sierra Club to resist the tactics of California Forever/East Solano Plan. ​
• Greenbelt Alliance
• California 30 x 30 In October 2020, Governor Newsom issued Executive Order N-82-20 which establishes a state goal of conserving 30% of California’s lands and coastal waters by 2030 – known as 30×30.
• Bay Friendly Coalition
• California Native Plant Society
• California Climate and Agriculture Network (CalCAN)
• Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA)
• California Department of Fish and Wildlife, ATLAS OF THE BIODIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
• California Department of Water Resources: State Water Project

From the Exhibition Library: A Popup Booklist

WATER PODCASTS 

Place and Purpose
Talking Under Water
Waterloop
Words on Water
Sea Change
Circle of Blue

 

​Wildbound Live (video) Walk with Obi and Wade (American Naturalist Obi Kaufmann and CA Secretary for Natural Resources, Wade Crowfoot)

 

Arts Benicia’s Art Talks … and Timely Conversations Series

Ripple Effects: Exploring the Intersection of Art, Research and Water

Location: Arts Benicia
1 Commandant’s Lane, Benicia
Wednesday, December 6th, 2023
6:30 – 8:00 pm
Free and open to the public

Event Description: Can art offer unique ways to approach the vast uncertainties of the climate crisis? Can art help connect us to an ambiguous future by injecting imagination, emotion, and curiosity? Visual artists Hughen/Starkweather and Lordy Rodriguez discuss the role of water as a concept, concern, and inspiration in their research-based art practices.

Lordy Rodriguez is on the board of Arts Benicia. His works explore the human urge to locate/define oneself by charting the environment in precise detail. Using the language of cartography, he makes drawings that go beyond map-making into abstracted, imaginary terrain. One of his earliest bodies of work, the America series, involved redrawing the boundaries and locations of the 50 United States and the cities within them. Subsequent works, including the Abstracted and Geological series, pushed the iconography of mapmaking further into abstraction, omitting the text that is so crucial to cartography. Lordy’s newest works on paper utilize the map as a framework in which to experiment with unorthodox combinations of familiar visual languages from a variety of sources, including advertising, reality TV, fashion, gift-wrapping, and signature images associated with celebrity artists. lordyrodriguez.com

 

 

Hughen/Starkweather is the collaboration of artists Jennifer Starkweather and Amanda Hughen, who have worked as a team for almost 20 years. Together they create research-based, abstract artworks about specific topics or locations. For the past several years Hughen/Starkweather have researched the impacts of climate disruption on places where water meets land, exploring engineered, human-made structures that are increasingly, inextricably interwoven with natural systems in the landscape, and how these systems might fail or succeed together. hughenstarkweather.com

 

 

 

 

Family Art Day

Location: Arts Benicia
1 Commandant’s Lane, Benicia
Sunday, December 3, 2023
1-3 pm

Family Art Day is a creative artmaking experience for families. Our December Family Art Day took place during the Solano Water Stories Kickoff Exhibition. After creating artwork in the Arts Benicia classroom, young artists visited and interacted with the Solano Water Stories exhibition. They enjoyed reading books in the pop-up library (we had books for all ages) and wrote poetry in the poetry corner. Their parents were also able to spend time in the exhibition, learning about water conservation and sustainability because their children were there! Arts Benicia Family Art Day is always a free event and open to the public.

 

 

 

The second exhibition, Solano Water Stories  Artists’ Voices was also part of Stewarding our Water Resources: Solano Artists Create, Collaborate & Educate. This unique project was intended to shed light on critical environmental issues and spark conversations about sustainability and social justice, showcasing a vibrant collection of new works by artists and poets from the Vallejo and Benicia communities.  The exhibition featured commissioned works by thirteen Solano County artists who draw upon their diverse community experiences to explore and communicate the themes through artwork. The works range in media from painting, to fiber, to sculpture.

Arts Benicia and Askari Sowonde Productions presented Nzuri Soul & Band June 14, 5 – 9 pm at the Temple Art Lofts, celebrating the artists and exhibitions from Arts Benicia and Vallejo Center for the Arts. This free event was part of the June 14 Vallejo Art Walk. Askari Sowonde, artist, curator, and performer, is a Vallejo area community organizer with extensive experience working with local BIPOC and marginalized communities.

 

See Artists’ Voices Exhibition Here
photography by Michael van Auken

Featured artists: 
Miro Salazar
Tramaine de Senna
Janet Barnes
Sheree Rayford
Tereasa Tso
Lawrence H. Buford
Vincent Concepcion
Alicia Gomez
Daniel Valadez
Desirée Vicente
Mario Saucedo
Carl Heyward
Akiko Suzuki (Benicia Magazine article)

 

 

Solano Water Stories at the Suisun City Community Climate Resilience Fair

Location: Joseph A. Nelson Community Center
Date: June 29, 2024, 2:30-5:30 pm
Free and open to the public

The third and final exhibition, Solano Water Stories, Suisun City Community Climate Resilience Fair, was organized by Sustainable Solano’s Co-Executive Director, Allison Nagel and Program Manager, Nicole Newell.  Arts Benicia brought artwork, videos and free educational materials. This provided an excellent opportunity for the community to learn about sea level rise, flood risk and creative solutions while experiencing the importance of water, marshland and mitigation through a variety of engaging exhibits, and speakers.

 

 

Artists:
Desirée Vicente
Tereasa Tso
Miro Salazar
Ronna Leon

Suisun City communities are vulnerable to increasing flood events as a result of climate change.
Suisun City is actively exploring both the challenges from increasing flood risk and the
opportunities to address those challenges.

Speakers at the climate fair discussed topics including sea level rise and where there is potential for nature-based solutions to flooding, such as marsh restoration or living levees.  Arts Benicia shared presentation space with the Exploratorium. Solano Water Stories connection to the Suisun Marsh estuary in southern Solano County, included original artwork, educational content and videos. Our presentation was certainly enhanced with Exploratorium  2 and 3-D topography maps of the SF Bay Estuary. After all, it’s all connected.

Speakers at the event included Suisun City Mayor Alma Hernandez, experts from the San Francisco Estuary Institute and the Fairfield-Suisun Sewer District, which is currently working on a wastewater treatment wetland project. Read about FSSD Resilient and Green Master Plan.

Short Film Screening: 
Hidden Heroes, about Emily Corwin, Fairfield Suisun Irrigation District

 

Media Campaign: Arts Benicia and Sol Trans

Stewarding our Water Resources: Solano Artists Create, Collaborate, and Educate-Solano Water Stories final project engaged artists and cross-sector partners in creating original artwork and materials to help educate Californians about water conservation and climate mitigation. Arts Benicia organized a media campaign with Sol Trans, creating posters for Sol Trans Vallejo Transit Center interior, outside on the Center’s kiosk, and a digital display inside Sol Trans buses.

The Vallejo Transit Center averages 1,540 riders per weekday. Other transit partners coming into the center such as Greyhound, Napa, and Capitol Corridor also have access to these Sol Trans ads.

Artists Desirée Vicente and Miro Salazar artworks were featured inside the Transit Center and on the bus kiosks

The artwork of Tramaine de Senna is featured inside Sol Trans buses in digital poster format.

Wendy White, Creative Director and Founder of TRYBE Creative LLC, designed the Sol Trans Solano Water Stories posters

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stewarding our Water Resources: Solano Artists Create, Collaborate, and Educate

Celeste Smeland, Project Manager, Artistic Director
Celeste Smeland is an artist, and arts educator, has extensive career experience with non-profit arts organizations and cross-sector work with other cultural and community organizations. She has worked with many Bay Area organizations, including Sonoma Valley Museum of Art, the Vallejo Community Arts Foundation, Kala Art Institute and the Institute of Noetic Sciences. As Executive Director of Arts Benicia, she is a project lead artist for the grant and will serve as exhibition curator for the project. A resident of Vallejo, she will be a liaison with Vallejo artists and community organizations.

Jean Purnell, Assistant Project Manager
Jean Purnell has over 30 years of experience in university administration, instruction, and development, and has been a successful fundraiser for the University of the Pacific, the Brubeck Institute, and Arts Benicia, where she also manages membership development, and helps coordinate exhibitions and events. She holds the B.A. degree in Music and Biology from Wake Forest University, the M.A. (Musicology) and M.S. (Library Science) degrees from University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, and the Ed.D. in Educational Administration from University of the Pacific. She exhibits her paintings at Gallery 621 in Benicia, where she is a member.

About Arts Benicia