Artists
United States of America
Lis Sundberg
MUTUALISMS
07.02.24 28.02.24
Lis Sundberg is an artist born in Sarasota, FL, to an artist and a teacher with a penchant for home improvement projects, the outdoors and roaming. Her parents raised her and her sister as Quakers, encouraging them to engage with social justice movements. As such, they became faith allies to the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW), a farmworker-led advocacy group for farmworkers picking tomatoes in Southwest Florida. The community effort that goes into organizing protests, which they learned while working with the CIW, is her biggest inspiration. Specifically, the energy a protest has when every voice sings in unity.
Lis was part of our online program Together Apart, in its English cohort under the theme (and title) of MUTUALISMS.
ARTIST STATEMENT & TESTIMONY
As an artist, I am interested in engaging my audience in art production. I have participated in collaborative art projects, some designed by me and some by others. I am inspired by the process of working with others. The original idea for projects evolves based on those who are involved. Collaborative artwork is out of the control of a singular person. Through collective effort the practice becomes very expansive and dynamic. I am constantly seeking new ways to create works that arise in collaboration with community.
I am so glad I was a part of MUTUALISMS because it was such an interesting way to work with others. My fellow participants had a wide range of interests and knowledge to share, which made the residency enriching and well-rounded. I liked the format of being able to meet with people in so many different time zones, which inspired my group while we were creating our project, Now and Not Now. While some may look at a residency confined to the individual boxes of a zoom screen as too limiting, I acknowledged the limits of remote interaction and thought of it as a tool as opposed to a restriction. I recommend this residency as a chance to build international connections while integrating the juxtaposition of other peoples’ lives and routines into your own life and routine. Truly a special and unique experience.
BIO
Lis Sundberg
2000 | Sarasota, FL
Lives in St. Paul, USA
EDUCATION
2022 | Joint BA in Human Rights and Studio Arts. Bard College, USA
EXHIBITIONS & AWARDS
2022 | WVU Food Justice in Appalachia. WVU Library, USA
2022 | Re-Rooting/Re-Routing. Bard College, USA
2022 | Davis Peace Prize – Tracing the Turnrow Web: Appalachia Rising, West Virginia, USA
2021 | West Virginia Department of Art and Culture Grant Award. Sprouting Farms Mural, Talcott, USA
Related Activities
Together Apart
# 8: Mutualisms | Results
Artists in Dialogue
07.02.24 28.02.24
In this new edition of Together Apart, we met again, this time under the title Mutualisms. During 4 weeks of intense exchange, 12 artists from different countries and cities collaborated and contributed to create this space of mutuality in which to freely explore their ideas.
In the words of Daniela Ruiz Moreno, program curator: “The 8th edition of Together Apart was, once more, a very gratifying surprise to us—
the coordinators and creators of the programme. It was very interesting to see how the individual interests of each artist were articulated with each other through collaboration across different disciplines, the generation of collective archives, and the invention of methodologies for coexistence. We were able to observe a gradual development, akin to an accumulation and metabolization of all the knowledge and information shared by the various team members and the invited artist, Rodrigo de Arteaga, as well as the invaluable knowledge shared by each participant. We explored alternative approaches to artistic practice, a different way of conceiving scientific knowledge, and acted in response to the urgent need for these two areas to collaborate more frequently. As one of the participants mentioned, the final session felt as watching -in a fast forward speed- a garden grow. Bringing back one of the philosophers who accompanied us during this program, I would like to quote again the words of Michael Marder regarding the writings of Hildegard von Bingen, a Benedictine abbess who in the 12th century was contemplating more holistic and spiritual approaches to ecology and the plant world. Hildegard proposes to look at the mystery of plantness, of greening greenness, of growth. I believe that the arts, in relation to many other forms of knowledge, serve as a vehicle to achieve an awareness of the interdependence inherent in all forms of life on this planet and a re-enchantment with the mystery that life forms entail. Each participant in this program allowed us to do just that, from observing the mystery of trees that make many fundamental cycles of our lives possible, to the landscapes that surround us and shape us, the different constructions and perceptions of time, to the intricate and not entirely straightforward relationship of our coexistence and co-creation with technology and nature.”
