Free Talk by White Mountain National Forest Artists in Residence Thursday in Campton

Miami-based eco artist Xavier Cortada and  sound artist/composer Juan Carlos Espinosa will talk about their work on Thursday, July 12, at 7 pm at White Mountain National Forest Headquarters in Campton.

The program is free and open to the public. Cortada and Espinosa are currently serving as Artists in Residence on the Forest, part of a collaboration, now in its second year, between the WMNF and the Arts Alliance of Northern New Hampshire. 

The artists have worked together on numerous projects over the last few years, most related to their shared environmental concerns. Their eco-art practice is defined by interdisciplinary collaboration and participatory practices that involve artists, scientists, and communities with the goal of public awareness and bioremediation.

Throughout July, they will meet with White Mountain National Forest scientists, foresters and trail workers – as well as with the local community -- to develop ideas for their work. Inspired by and responding to the Forest, they will create site-specific works and temporary installations.

Composer Juan Carlos Espinosa grew up in Miami. He reflects his concern for environmental issues, as well as his concern for the withering of human and cultural memory, in his music and sound art.

Many of his early musical experiences involve outdoors, stargazing and Saturday morning cartoons. Espinosa is from a family of classical music fans who also liked the outdoors. Whether it was Wagner on the radio on the way to the camp or the chirp-chirp-buzz of an Everglades night, his father insisted he ‘open’ his ears to understand that all sound was musical. This democratic approach to sound influenced Espinosa’s earliest compositions as a teen and informs his work today. Espinosa will discuss the evolution of his work from early thematic/descriptive compositions to a more eclectic path that ranges from sound collage to works for voices and acoustic instruments. He will also share recent work, highlighting collaborations with choreographers, filmmakers and visual artists.

Xavier Cortada has created art installations at the North Pole and South Pole to address environmental concerns at every point in between. He’s been commissioned to create art for the White House, the World Bank, Miami City Hall, Miami-Dade County Hall, Florida Botanical Gardens, the Miami Art Museum, Museum of Florida History, Miami Science Museum and the Frost Art Museum. Cortada has also developed numerous collaborative art projects globally, including peace murals in Cyprus and Northern Ireland, child welfare murals in Bolivia and Panama, AIDS murals in Geneva and South Africa, and eco-art projects in Taiwan, Holland, Hawaii and Latvia.

Cortada will offer a PowerPoint presentation discussing his participatory eco-art projects around the world, engaging the local to address the global. He will also share his evolving ideas about the site-specific installation he is developing during the New Hampshire residency.

For additional information – or to volunteer on one of their projects -- call the Arts Alliance at 323-7302 or email info@aannh.org.