Drawing or even photography which exists as a static final image in a frame obscures the artist’s journey of discovery. To make those hidden relationships visible and give viewers a view into what I learned, I developed a new form of drawing. Process Drawings, like the ones in this exhibit, center on the meditative process of discovery undertaken by the creator. In process drawings and the art which emerges from them, the journey of the artist is revealed by tracking or documenting the process and order as the creator makes marks on the page. Speed can be changed and “mistakes” can be undone, but ultimately, whatever choices are made, they become a part of the time lapse. Creation and destruction are linked in this way: while the entire thing is ephemeral, choices are permanent. Every choice has a pathway and must be “lived” with. Every choice changes what came before, sublimating what the artist was thinking or feeling into an accessible visual record.
Bio: Allida Warn is an artist, teacher, and visual researcher who creates participatory projects that offer a window into the creative process through contemplative works that make her journey of discovery visible to others. She studied Costume Technology and Design at DePaul University’s Theatre School, and Fiber and Materials Studies and Print Media at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago before moving to Spain and completing a Teaching Fellowship while completing her B.A. from DePaul University in Art and Education. When she landed back in the States, she began working freelance as a designer, educator, and arts administrator in California and Michigan. In 2017 she completed the Arts in Education master’s program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and presently lives and works in the City of Boston. The videos and prints being shown are Songs of Urban Ecology which is a socially engaged and multi-disciplinary project. The songs include celebrations of places that I have lived with images and sounds that highlight the invisible and interconnected contrast between what is natural, and what is human. The first series of photos took place over three years walking along the same path in Ann Arbor, Michigan, my home town. The song came from a recording made one morning as I paused to listen to the joyful sound of birds returning to Boston in the spring of 2020. Inspired by Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara’s Cantus Arcticus, I purchased a flute and recorded layers of sound to meld with the mixture of bird song and sirens rushing along the Jamaicaway to the nearby hospitals.