I’ve had the good fortune to meet an amazing artist, Jill Drllevich. She is embarking on the most ambitious project of her life, one that has grown from a nucleus of an idea into a multi-faceted and profound community art project.
It began when Drllevich came across more than 200 industrial fan blades intended to cool the Satsop Nuclear Power Plant which was planned for Elma, Washington but ultimately never came to fruition. She purchased them and knew they would serve as the inspiration for a profound community art project in the future.
While the blades themselves may have a negative connotation, the project is quite the contrary, Drllevich noted. “I want to create an awareness about kindness, about sustainability, about coming together more than arguing.”
The latest project of Blades of Change is The Tipping Point, a group exhibition featuring 9 Seattle area artists in various mediums who have been invited to use the nuclear power cooling blades as their personal canvases. This exhibition will come to FOGUE Gallery in Seattle’s Georgetown neighborhood in March 2022.I am honored to be one of the artists to participate in this first exhibition.
THE TIPPING POINT, My Proposal
“Blades of Change stands for all the good we can do.” -Jill Drllevich
We have watched as the Earth becomes more and more compromised: oceans full of trash, polluted waterways, poor air quality, ice caps melting. Our environment is in trouble and as it gets increasingly critical, the damage becomes more evident and yet humans continue to add to the devastation. I have always hated litter and as a Girl Scout, I learned how important it was to be a good steward of Mother Earth. Recycling and keeping my consumption to a minimum has become a mindful priority (though not when it comes to art materials). Seeing the recent Climate Clock installed in Times Square scared me; it was my seminal moment. A beacon, a signal, a reckoning. It is counting down Earth’s deadline, her tipping point: seven years, 100 days.
As a collage and assemblage artist, I work primarily with vintage and antique ephemera, the epitome of recycled materials. Though environment issues have not been consciously present in past work, I want to channel my concerns into a new series, Remnants. Remnant: A small remaining quantity of something, a surviving trace. Discarded things, trash, papers, notes, receipts, fabric, all recreated and reworked to turn these disparate items into something beautiful, revered. But just using recycled materials needs to be more than just aesthetic, it must make a statement. This call can become the cornerstone of that body of work.
THE FINAL BALANCING ACT
My concept: Disparate layers from apocalyptic to utopian.
The blade will be graffitied and have a steel box (48 x 18 x 6) inserted through it, also covered in graffiti and rusted. One side is open (sealed with plexiglass) and filled with trash showing how humans are destroying earth (tar, collaged graffiti, and trash), total urban decay. The back of the steel box will have an etched quote from Russell Means, Oglala Lakota Nation activist.
Materials: Asphalt tar, dirt, salvaged posters, trash, steel, ephemera, spray paint, acrylic paint, felt pen, found materials.
Base: Supporting the blade will be a base made of crumbling concrete with spaces for grass/weeds to grow, further showing urban decay.