Catherine Page-Harris
Frontier Fellow March 2013
Website
Catherine Page Harris, Interdisciplinary Assistant Professor, teaches Art and Ecology and Landscape Architecture at the University of New Mexico in a split position with the College of Fine Arts and the School of Architecture and Planning. She received her BA from Harvard University, 1988, MLA from UC Berkeley, 1997, and MFA from Stanford University, 2005. Harris works in art/design, and digital/analog expressions. Her built work resides at Deep Springs College (White Mountains, CA), McCovey Field (San Francisco, CA) and The Violin Shop (Albuquerque, NM) amongst other sites. Recent projects include collaborations with Alexander Webb and Nina Dubois on modular explorations of space at Montessa Park for High Desert Test Sites and trans-species habitat furniture with Sam Martin, shown at the Santa Fe Art Institute among other spaces. Transpecies habitat, ecological flow, and morphogenesis, are current theoretical foci.
Inside an inflatable.
“Seeds, whether from a crop or from the mind of a young student, carry the capacity to create a huge amount of change from something much smaller. Seeds are symbols of potential, of future growth, of the beginning of ideas.” -The students of UNM’s Creating Change
Creating Change, an interdisciplinary art class at the University New Mexico, had the pleasure of being invited to work with the Epicenter, CHEER teen programming, and Green River High School (GRHS) on this subject of seeds and change. Their class, led by Catherine Page-Harris and Andrea Polli, experimented with building inflatable sculpture, and worked in high school classes and the CHEER after school program to design and build inflatable seeds. The inflatable seeds were co-created and designed by the students.
Judith Trejo performing inside of the cube inflatable.
Throughout the week, teams of university students visited classes at Green River High to begin discussions about seeds as symbols for the beginnings of ideas. They worked the drawing and painting, 3-D modeling, clothing construction, and environmental science classes at GRHS. Using their experience and interests, the students designed three dimensional, ten foot tall seeds, to be built with the university students with the CHEER after school program and showcased in the GRHS gym. There were performances, food, inflatable fashion, and fun.
Artist and AmeriCorps VISTA Ashley Ross face-painting at the event.
The UNM students enjoyed the productive week of exploring seeds with Epicenter and Green River high school students! Catherine Harris and Creating Change were in Green River for one week as a Frontier Fellowship blitz.
UNM students and professors with GRHS students and Epicenter AmeriCorps VISTA Armando Rios.
