Liz Donadio

In collaboration with Shannon Collis

On view at ICA Gallery January 5-26, 2019.

By challenging perceptions of the built environment, Singular Space captures the essence and physicality of municipal art, viewed through an abstract lens and connected to the urban landscape. Collis and Donadio have created a multi-faceted portrait of Forum Fountain, a Brutalist-inspired public sculpture located behind Paul Laurence Dunbar High School in East Baltimore. The culminating installation expands the life of Forum Fountain and features immersive video projection and sound. Architecture can be an extension of the physical self: Buildings tell us about our bodies, both personal and social, and structure our experiences and behaviors. Singular Space serves as a multi-sensory palimpsest, reminding us that public space is mutable and cannot be erased- even in the face of continual destruction or neglect.

Press:

BmoreArt Review

Inertia Exhibition Visit

Lumen prints consist of black & white photographic paper, physical objects, sunlight, and time. Each variable in this camera-less process can be manipulated and shifted to produce mysterious, one of a kind pictures. For this series, I made impressions of the water and plant life in Rock Creek, a 32 mile long tributary of the Potomac River that stretches from Maryland to Washington, DC. Some are partially treated with fixer, with the chemistry used as a drawing material to heighten the visual sensation of being underwater. Others are created in combination with digital negatives of photographs along eroded away areas of Rock Creek, a precipitous carving away of the earth. In total, these images are a brief portrait of my experience walking along the water, collecting plants, and getting lost in the landscape.

All prints are 30x40” archival pigment prints from unique lumen photographs

Made in conjunction with the Lumens photographs, this series documents the natural habitats and human-made structures of a section of Rock Creek that I explored during a 2018 summer residency. I consulted scientists and ecologists directly engaged with stream health, watershed management, stormwater runoff, erosion, and environmental mediation. Working both in the park and the studio, I documented with digital and analog photography, video, and audio field recordings, to consider how photography, video, and sound can transmit both the facts and qualities of a place. The work culminates in a multi-media sensory installation that adds to an evolving historical and geographical record of a major watershed running from Maryland through the District of Columbia.

All are 16x20, 20x24, or 24x30” archival pigment prints

In collaboration with Shannon Collis

Dismantled in late 2016, McKeldin Fountain was part of Baltimore's urban landscape for over three decades. An unembellished Brutalist structure, it was poetically designed to evoke natural rock formations of the Susquehanna River, fusing natural ecology and modern design into the heart of downtown. A designated free-speech zone, McKeldin was home to Occupy Baltimore in 2011 and Black Lives Matter protests in 2015.

As a collaborative audio-visual project, we documented the fountain's last days to conjure a meditation on the essence of this urban landmark. Using projection-mapping software, video shot on site traverses large sculptural forms that reference shapes of the fountain itself, culminating in a sensory memorial experience.

On view:

Current Space, August 12 - September 3, 2017
InLight Richmond, November 3rd, 2017
Light City Baltimore, April 14 - 21, 2018

In October 2016 I was an artist in residence at the Lacawac Sanctuary and Biological Field Station in Pennsylvania's Pocono Mountains. My work was focused on documenting the sanctuary itself as well as the scientific machinery and recording devices used by researchers year round. I found the juxtaposition of natural scenery and mechanical instruments to be quite beautiful.

From the deserts of far west Texas to coastal Turkey, these pictures present an archive of quiet moments where shape, space, and color connect the distances between. With my camera, I focus on the beauty of silence and stillness, giving importance to the small ordinary things that are usually passed by.  

An ongoing project documenting landscapes in far west Texas. Images are from roadsides, the small town of Marfa, the Chihuahuan Desert Research Institute, & Big Bend National Park. Wide open spaces, intimate rooms & multiple exposures speak to the magical, calming nature of this environment. 

When I was young I wished that my eyes functioned like a camera. I would only have to blink and whatever image that was in front of me would be captured and saved exactly as it was, to preserve and store the moment. Today I imagine my whole body as a camera, light comes in and through, recording and reflecting. Mechanical technology is what I use to actually document images but the idea that my eyes are also a lens has stayed with me.

These images are part of my 2012 MFA thesis exhibition which included photographs, video, and sound installation.