Wave Pool’s second Artist in Residence and winners of an ‘Art Space Is Your Space’ residency award, Stairwell’s, arrived mid-July 2015 to begin their investigative art project and series of public ‘field trips’ based on Cincinnati’s public stairways.
Stairwell’s is a collaboration started by San Francisco-based artists Sarah Hotchkiss and Carey Lin in 2011. They organize temporary exhibitions, produce short publications and lead group excursions (Field Trips) in and around stairs and stair-related structures. Through these public programs, Stairwell’s aims to create fun and accessible ways to engage with the idea of site-specificity.
How does focusing on one simple action — traversing changes in elevation — heighten awareness of our surroundings? Stairwell’s will use their time at Wave Pool to focus on planning and leading 2-3 free Field Trip walking tours through Cincinnati stairways.
On Thursday, July 23, from 7 to 9 p.m., during Wave Pool’s regularly scheduled open Critique Night, they hosted an Open House to share initial research and to gather more ideas for the upcoming Field Trips from local artists and community members. Help them transform the Wave Pool gallery into an ad hoc research lab and conversation space by sharing your stories about Cincinnati stairs.
Based on these stories, recommendations and their own explorations, they crafted a special Field Trip for Cincinnati. These group walking tours took place on July 26 andJuly 30. Past Field Trips have included impromptu games, surprise snacks, group musical efforts and other artist-led activities. Each Field Trip is based on its unique location, history, architecture and thematic elements encountered along the way.
An exhibition featuring documentation of their time in Cincinnati as well as pastStairwell’s Field Trips opened the Wave Pool gallery at the end of their residency, on Saturday, August 1, 7-10pm and ran through August 22nd.
Art Space is Your Space was supported in 2015 by the generosity of community contributions to the ArtsWave Campaign.
