SUGAR MAPLE GLACIAL LAKE STATION
SARA SMITH
SEP 2—Nov 11
Sugar Maple Glacial Lake Station is part of artist Sara Smith’s larger multimedia project Inside the Breath (In Network Time), set in a future era called INT. At the heart of this project are questions about the physical, political, and spiritual implications of understanding humans as part of an interdependent system, with one another, with other species, and within Earth's ecosystems.
Smith developed the core ideas of the INT world by mapping aspects of octopuses' sensory-perceptual abilities to the writings and ideas of the queer Chicana activist and scholar Gloria Anzaldúa. In INT, animal and bacterial communication networks make our shared existence possible. This exhibition imagines that we are living in the care networks of INT and invites us to consider how we might collectively reach toward a more just, ecological, and actively interconnected existence. What pathways are possible from here to INT? What must we shift?
Sara Smith F90 creates speculative-documentary performances and other works that explore interconnection and the poetics and politics of embodied and archival research. Their working process is rooted in physical practices of micro-attention and relational transformation. Sara's artworks have been seen and heard in theaters, museums, studios, public parks, recreation center basements, and cloud-based platforms.
● ● ●
This exhibition is curated by Lorenzo Conte, Gallery Director.
Sugar Maple Glacial Lake Station is an instance of the larger project Inside the Breath (In Network Time) and includes contributions from multiple regional collaborators. Thanks to Gina Siepel, Kathy Couch, Meredith Bove, María José Gimenez, Barbie Diewald, Jules Skloot, Karinne Keithley Syers, Rebecca Pappas, Tyler Rai, and everyone in the extended Network Time Human Chorus, the Leyden Wildlife Management Area forest, and The Prelinger Library.
Project research was made possible by the archivists who maintain and ensure access to Gloria Anzldúa’s archives at The Benson Latin American Collections at the University of Texas Libraries and at UC Santa Cruz Special Collections & Archives. Partial project funding was provided through an Environmental Artistic Activism grant from the Puffin Foundation.
Detail: Giant pacific and day octopuses swim-pattern scores, 2024. graphite on paper. Courtesy of the artist.
Still frame image from Shift Again, 2024. Digital video ( 11:20). Courtesy of the artist.
Installation image of Sugar Maple Glacial Lake Station, February 12 - March 2, 2025, A.P.E. Gallery.
Still frame image from Shift Again, 2024. Digital video ( 11:20). Courtesy of the artist.
Installation image of Sugar Maple Glacial Lake Station, February 12 - March 2, 2025, A.P.E. Gallery.
Still frame image from Shift Again, 2024. Digital video ( 11:20). Courtesy of the artist.
Detail image from bring us a lower love, 2024. Three sculptures and nine prints with sand, light boxes, glass objects, compost, wooden boxes; compost, powdered mica, wheat paste; digital photo collage. Courtesy of the artist.
Sugar Maple Glacial Lake Station, Illustration, 2024. Courtesy of the artist.
Detail image of A deeper path, 2024. Four prints with compost, powdered mica, and wheat paste on paper. Courtesy of the artist.
SARA SMITH
Sara Smith F90 is a transdisciplinary choreographer and librarian. Sara creates speculative-documentary performances and other works that explore interconnection and the poetics and politics of embodied and archival research. Their working process is rooted in physical practices of micro-attention and relational transformation.
Sara’s artworks have been seen and heard in theaters, museums, studios, public parks, recreation center basements, cloud-based platforms, and a mini-FM radio station. They have collaborated and learned with many other artists, most regularly with writer and interdisciplinary artist Karinne Keithley Syers (F92) and visual artist Gina Siepel. In addition, Sara has written about, presented on, and taught workshops in dance, performance, and creative research for over 25 years. They have a BA from Hampshire College, an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College, and an MLS from Simmons College. Sara has received the Massachusetts Cultural Council Fellowship award in Choreography, and support from The LEF Foundation, Maine Arts Commission, NEFA, the Puffin Foundation, and residency fellowships from MacDowell, Yaddo, Hewnoaks, and The American Antiquarian Society. From 2010-2017 Sara edited KINEBAGO, a forum for writing by and about New England dance makers and movement researchers. Since 2013, Sara has been the Arts & Humanities Librarian at Amherst College.