We have had the pleasure of studying wildcrafting with the following artists.

Click on images to see more about each artist.

Ashlee Mays, Teacher's Assistant
Pigeon Forge, TN

As a printmaker, most of the pieces I make derive from some kind of book structure. The structure of a book is simple and its function is intuitive. While books are generally static objects, they are built to be in motion. The spine of a book demonstrates just the right amount of flexibility to allow access. The book form is a vehicle for information, information that was important enough to mechanize and disseminate. Printmaking for me has always been about a mechanism.

It is one thing to say something, it is another thing to write it down, and it is a completely different thing to carve, engrave, design, and print that same thing. My work focuses on these symbols that signify our human desires, and their motion. Their motion through both their mechanization of production, and the way they disseminate into banality. Many of my pieces move from place to place, sometimes through space and sometimes through ownership. Printmaking provides the conceptual spine that supports my interdisciplinary practice. My art pieces are almost always interactive, asking the viewer to physically place themselves in this portrait of connectivity. Nowadays we do not rely on movable type to get us our daily news. It seems that we no longer rely on the accuracy of the artist’s hand to illustrate scientific information. Printmaking mobilized the first information revolution. We are experiencing another one, and this one did not appear out of thin air. I am looking to expose the seemingly invisible lines that connect our day to day experiences with a larger mechanism. It appears to me that Botanists are sometimes doing the same thing. The parking ticket you got last week, the souvenir from your last vacation- these artifacts all have a complex history. They quietly shape an experience that you are actively participating in.

Liz Guertin, Columbia, MD

My mission in life is to connect people to the outdoors. To foster that connection so that we may protect wild places. It's been the defining purpose in my work as an outdoor leader, teacher, activist, and now, as an artist. While I'm new to art, I am not new to the inspiration, or to the daily pursuit of wild experiences.

With respect to photography, I've spent the last year on a serious, daily effort to photograph birds in their natural surroundings. Learning about light, bird behavior, songs, calls, aperture, shutter speed, and my own personal vision has given me a new perspective on the natural world. And now, as my work turns more abstract, I’m focused on capturing the essence of birds and their habitat -- to present something others want to experience. My work is at its best when it contains a mix of the literal, the mysterious, and my wonder, all at the same time.

Building this project over the last year has been a life-force for me and my community. Through such a difficult time, we can find connection in the beauty of the wild things in our own backyards. I can't bring the people to wild places, so I bring the wild places to the people.

Isabel Winson-Sagan,
Santa Fe, New Mexico

A lot of my work lately has used the fleeting nature and movement of natural phenomena, such as water. I’m very influenced by the land art of the Southwestern United States, and have done several installation pieces that were designed to degrade. I also use water and ink to print unique abstract art in a process called “suminagashi.”

Alyssa Roggow, Great Falls, Montana

When I was three, migrating monarchs came to rest on the linden tree in my parents’ backyard, and for a single magical afternoon the tree shimmered, a black-and-orange kaleidoscope of butterflies. I spent the rest of my childhood waiting for them to return.

Migration is a normal part of life for a monarch, but I was overcome with wonderment and grief at the brief transformation of my familiar surroundings. My work as a musician, writer, and composer arises from a deep awe of unexpected encounters with “the Other”, and seeks to honor the vivid emotions and sensory experiences that arise in such moments. I am inspired by natural systems and phenomena, and my creative process continually morphs to meet the environments, materials, and subjects of the work on their own terms, so I can listen more closely to what they are trying to say.

Jeff Mann, Montreal, Canada

Working across drawing, animation, video, textiles, and ceramics, Jeff Mann’s work engages with notions and feelings of sensuality, movement, and abstraction - seeking to convey that which is beyond purely immanent experience and understanding. Inspired by various historical sources of
symbols and symbolic thinking, his work abstracts images of nature, the body, light, colour, and geometric forms into compositions and films that are aesthetically numinous and spiritually yearning.

Each project starts with a spontaneous feeling, desire, gesture, or image that is then investigated and improvised upon throughout the process of making. Mann is attracted to natural foraging practices. Making his own inks, dyes, and photo developers from foraged plants, and searching the landscape for video footage and field recordings for his film collages, he sees working with natural materials a form of communion with nature. Through his work, he refers to subjects like the projective growth patterns of plants, sensory systems of flora and fauna, various historical theories of colour, and a sense of connection with the more-than-human world. His work is an invitation to explore a worldview of interconnection between nature, spirit, and the body.

Annie Thibault, Gatineu, Quebec

Inspired by an aesthetic in wich art, science, and nature overlap, her multi-disciplinary practice includes drawing, sculpture, installation, photography, and video. By making use of the tools and technical resources of biological research laboratories and learning centres, she embraces organic matter itself as an artistic material, distilling it into a universe imbued with mystery. Her interest for the underground growth networks of mushrooms as interconnected ecological systems has led her to create works that in some ways question, both scientifically and artistically, the sensitivity of non-human life forms and the resilience of nature.

Meg Nicks, Alberta

As a visual artist, the intricate details of nature are captivating. Natureʼs flow and rhythms and the interconnectivity of its patterns and design are subjects for art. The mountain environment is my major focus, an apparently solid, but infinitely changeable environment, where life, tough yet fragile, prospers in a severe world. We must look closely to appreciate all that is here. Flowers, mosses, lichen. The black patterns on aspen trees. Salamanders and seeds. Even the rusting of artifacts left behind.

Microscopy brings what is invisible to our attention. This has always interested me. Diatoms, trilobites, the Burgess Shale creatures and views through the microscope. To be able to photograph and have access to what is often unseen or simply unnoticed would be inspirational and assist in building my personal photographic library for use in collage.

Maria L Schechter, Carmel, Indiana

T6DH stands for The Six Directions of Healing. An accident provided me an opportunity to explore my inner architecture. I looked to the natural world to aid my healing process. The use of 6 healing modalities, which include diet, complementary, alternative, and integrative approaches to health offered me a second chance at life. In addition to the many surgeries on my arms and hands, I looked to the natural world for alternative remedies in relieving pain. Utilizing natural properties found in the plant and fungi kingdoms, such as turning to a more conscious diet, utilizing teas such as reishi and turkey tail mushrooms, and shifting to a more responsible worldview provided a radical recovery in health and wellbeing. The experience offered me the opportunity to ask how can I be more fully alive, and how can I show gratitude for the offerings of the plant and fungi kingdoms who have aided my recovery? In a recent discussion hosted online by Orion Magazine and Yale School of Forestry: "The Language of Trees: A Conversation with Kathleen Dean Moore and Alison Hawthorne Deming,” I learned all creations share the urge to live. They hold an urgency to protect the plants, animals, and environment which continue to provide us with its generous offerings. Understanding that we are all a part of something much larger than human life is how I find reverence for the natural world at the centerpiece of each work I now create.