Macatawa Strata is a community-based investigation into Lake Macatawa (its history and present) and the implications it has on the development of the city of Holland. The project incorporated public events where attendees inscribed maps, captured layered photographs and created unique dinnerware by pressing slabs of clay onto infrastructure. Research on current environmental conditions, history, aerial photographs, and GIS also inspired this project. Join Sara Alsum-Wassenaar, GVSU Professor of Visual Studies and GVSU students Tess Clark, Andrew Victory, and Katie Brewer as they discuss how they conducted these site-based explorations and how this layering of ideas allows for connections with the past that will inform choices made about land-use in the future. Learn more
This program took place on Thursday, March 23, 2023 at the Holland Museum.
Adult Cultural Lens program
An aerial view that helped inspire the project
A layered photograph
Watch the recorded program now!
Speaker Biographies
Sara Alsum-Wassenaar
Sara Alsum-Wassenaar (she/her) is currently faculty and staff at GVSU. She is a technology wrangler by day and a professor of technology-based interactive art by night. She focuses her artwork on space and place in her hometown of Holland. She utilizes traditional craft methods and new media processes to uncover relationships between the built environment and the handmade. She recently received funding for the Community Data Mapping project and will be developing a curriculum and working with area schools to produce this project.
Katherine Brewer
Katherine Brewer (she/they) is a scientist using art to process data and communicate concepts. Through traditional and digital techniques, they render geological time and morphological space into rhythmic patterns of pseudo-language which can bypass cognitive barriers of understanding. While they have worked on a variety of projects around the globe, Katherine is currently focused on the aquatic-terrestrial intersections of wetlands given their ecological importance and historical treatment.
Tess Clark
Tess Clark (she/her) is from Grand Rapids, MI where she is an artist, musician, and student. A senior in the visual studies program at Grand Valley State University, Tess has worked as a student research assistant for project Macatawa Strata while continuing to develop her personal practice. Focusing on painting, photography, video, and music, her work considers the collective nature of humanity in relationship to our natural, yet mystical environment.
Andrew Vickery
Andrew Vickery (he/him) is currently pursuing his BFA in Studio Art from Grand Valley State University. His area of Emphasis is Visual Studies, through which he explores multiple mediums including Ceramics, Sculpture, Printmaking, and Fiber arts. His work primarily focuses on the intersection of performative identity, organized religion, and sexual orientation. Andrew participated as a Student Research Assistant for the Macatawa Strata Project and helped with the creation of ceramic works including the pressed plates and coasters.
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