{"id":19747,"date":"2024-07-01T15:02:29","date_gmt":"2024-07-01T19:02:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/?p=19747"},"modified":"2025-05-15T15:00:28","modified_gmt":"2025-05-15T19:00:28","slug":"waves-of-creativity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/waves-of-creativity\/","title":{"rendered":"Waves of Creativity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Kimberly Callas stood aboard the R\/V Seahawk studying the deep water that swayed all around her. As hard as she tried, she couldn\u2019t tell what glided, lurked, or swam below the surface. There was just opaque ocean in every direction, broken only by the horizon line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI saw nothing,\u201d she remembers, \u201cand that was so interesting to me.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But how could she translate this formless sea into art? That was, after all, the point of her voyage. Callas, an associate professor of art and design, had joined several scientists from Monmouth\u2019s Urban Coast Institute (UCI) for a tour of their local research sites in late 2019. She was spending two years as artist-in-residence at UCI\u2014an M.F.A. working beside Ph.D.s; an artist blending facts with feelings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere was so much underneath me, yet I had no concept of what it was,\u201d Callas says of her outing on the UCI vessel. She later turned that into a 10-foot-tall mixed-media work, \u201cWhale Boat,\u201d which places a giant whale below a small\u2014and likely oblivious\u2014boat at sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhale Boat\u201d is part of her larger \u201cOcean Bodies\u201d series, which Callas has been working on for the past five years. Inspired by her time as a faculty fellow at UCI, \u201cOcean Bodies\u201d now includes more than 40 pieces, with images and symbols of water and whales, boats and nets, the horizon line and the human body. Many of these works highlight nature\u2019s beauty and its cosmic origins while also hinting at the threats and destruction it faces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think we all have this deep connection to nature, and we\u2019ve forgotten it,\u201d Callas says. But she\u2019s well aware. That\u2019s why she writes about it, teaches about it, and makes art about it\u2014including a solid month focusing on her \u201cOcean Bodies\u201d series earlier this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Callas spent all of March in Hungary as an artist in residence at the Art Quarter Budapest (AQB), an independent art center. Living and working alongside five other international artists, she\u2019d read and write each morning, then head into the studio for a full day of sketching, drawing, and digital sculpting. She met local artists and visited museums. At night, the artists in residence sat together discussing their day\u2019s work and swapping visions, perspectives, and techniques.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Going into her residency, Callas had planned to work on life-size human sculptures for her \u201cOcean Bodies\u201d series, and she did that. But she also found herself fixated on four tiny sketches she\u2019d made of people swimming. \u201cI was trying to be open to other ideas, but I kept coming back to the swimmers,\u201d she says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a resulting show at AQB, \u201cOcean Swimmers (Entanglement),\u201d Callas exhibited a quartet of four-foot-tall black-and-white drawings of her swimmers. Their bodies are each in different positions, but all are posed vertically, reaching out of the water and up toward the moon. She captured the whirling, blurry motion of ocean waves by using water-soluble graphite pencils on paper. It\u2019s a tricky medium to control, she says, but that\u2019s the point\u2014no one can control the ocean, either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
From Inspiration to Installation<\/strong>: The artist’s work in progress and on exhibit in Budapest. Photos by: Kimberly Callas (top two left),  Lisa Reiter (top right), Barnab\u00e1s Neogr\u00e1dy-Kiss (bottom)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

These new swimmers join her \u201cOcean Bodies\u201d series in trying to raise awareness of the ocean\u2019s role in climate regulation and stability. She says the \u201centanglement\u201d in their title refers to both humans\u2019 entanglement with the natural world and also the species-threatening entanglements that North Atlantic right whales face from ropes and ships at sea. (Right whales, which migrate through Jersey Shore waters, are seen throughout \u201cOcean Bodies,\u201d including in \u201cWhale Boat\u201d and \u201cNight Whale Entanglement.\u201d)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When it comes to addressing big environmental issues, \u201ceverybody needs to find their narrative,\u201d says Tony MacDonald, director of Monmouth\u2019s UCI. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSometimes scientists and lawyers think they can convince people of things by giving them facts,\u201d continues MacDonald, who is a lawyer himself. \u201cBut an even more powerful way to galvanize action is to get people emotionally involved. Kimberly\u2019s work really reflects that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Weaving ecological science into her art isn\u2019t new for Callas, nor is her deep concern for the climate crisis. In fact, during this interview, she\u2019s speaking from the sod-roofed, solar-powered, wood-heated stone house that she and her husband, George, built by hand in Brooks, Maine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That was her first eco-focused project. Neither of them knew how tough it would turn out to be, but building an off-the-grid home stone by stone appealed to both the environmentalist and artist in her. \u201cIt just sounded very sculptural and like something I could do,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Callas grew up in rural Northern Michigan, in a small town sandwiched between state and national forests. She spent most of her time playing outside, building houses out of sticks and collecting red wintergreen berries. \u201cThose were my favorite toys,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eager for a bigger pond, she studied sculpture at the University of Michigan, then moved to New York City to pursue her MFA in sculpture at the New York Academy of Art. She was walking to her studio, where she\u2019d been focusing on sculpting human figures, when she saw a plane smash into the World Trade Center on 9\/11. She was five months pregnant, and George had left the building only a few minutes earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy husband and I were already environmentally minded,\u201d she says. \u201cWe were weighing our garbage, we were vegetarian. But after 9\/11, we said, we really have to do something different.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enter the eco house, which they built together from 2003 to 2006. \u201cAt that point, I didn\u2019t know if I was going to make art again,\u201d she says. \u201cI thought the environmental crisis is the issue, and it felt like me sitting in my studio does nothing for that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the house complete, she and George cofounded with another couple a nonprofit institute, Newforest, which focused on sustainability research and education. That\u2019s where she first began collaborating with scientists. \u201cOur board had poets and economists and scientists, artists and engineers,\u201d she says. \u201cThe idea was that we\u2019re too siloed and can\u2019t deal with these environmental issues that way.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leading creativity workshops at Newforest brought Callas back to an artsy state of mind, and soon she was back in her studio. But her work was different now. It was focused squarely on nature. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even after Newforest closed in 2010, Callas continued her work at the intersection of art and sustainability, joining projects at Unity College and the Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory in Maine. She\u2019s keenly aware of the overlaps between her and her scientist collaborators. \u201cScientists go out in the field, and artists do, too,\u201d she says. \u201cWe\u2019re all looking so closely; it\u2019s all about observation. We all have tools we use, and a language and a process. It\u2019s fascinating when we bring all of those together.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Kimberly
Kimberly Callas in her studio on campus.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

But her collaborations extend well beyond scientists. When Callas came to Monmouth in 2016, she brought along one of her longest-running endeavors: Discovering the Ecological Self. The project took root during her years at Newforest and continues now as workshops, residencies, courses at Monmouth, and in Callas\u2019 own art. \u201cAll of my work falls under the Ecological Self,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While working in sustainability, she realized that personal connection, not scientific data, was most likely to sway people\u2019s outlooks and behavior. The Eco Self project centers on \u201cfinding out where that deep passion for nature is in you,\u201d Callas says. Maybe there\u2019s a specific tree that defined your childhood. Maybe you keep seeing crows everywhere, or a certain flower continues to pop up in your dreams. Whatever your connection to nature, Callas wants to help you discover it, explore it, and make art about it.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She weaves the Eco Self into her courses at Monmouth, including Eco Art (AR 231) and Sculpture II (AR 218), and she\u2019s brought it to museums, libraries, nonprofits, and universities near and far. \u201cWe need to reawaken this ecological self,\u201d Callas says. \u201cIt\u2019s there. There\u2019s no way we can be separated. But our life is designed in so many ways to have us think that we are separate. And that\u2019s how we don\u2019t see the destruction.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a result of her Eco Self programs, \u201cI want people to become environmental activists. I want them to become social-practice artists,\u201d she says. \u201cI\u2019ve had people leave the art school and go into environmental science after taking that course.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Megan Delaney, an associate professor at Monmouth who focuses on ecotherapy and ecopsychology, published a paper about Callas\u2019 Eco Self work\u2014specifically, a workshop collaboration between her Sculpture II class and the nearby Aslan Youth Ministry. For multiple weeks, Callas\u2019 students guided the children from Aslan through the Discovering the Eco Self process and into creating their own social-practice art pieces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think we tend to take care of things that we have a connection to and feel rooted in,\u201d Delaney says. \u201cIf we\u2019re going to take care of our place in space, we have to feel connected to it, and Kimberly does that through her Eco Self project in creative ways.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

I\u2019m interested in exploring our emotional attachments to nature and the process of how we create meaning out of the natural world.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

She notes that Callas\u2019 own art offers further ways in. \u201cWhen we see beautiful paintings of nature, we feel connected to saving it or valuing its importance,\u201d Delaney says. \u201cHer art encourages people to explore those feelings.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Soon that art will be viewable on campus, inside Monmouth\u2019s Rotary Ice House Gallery. In January 2025, Callas will open a solo show of \u201cOcean Bodies,\u201d filling both the upstairs and downstairs spaces. She\u2019s looking forward to showing her work to the Monmouth community, including her collaborators Delaney, MacDonald, and the other UCI scientists, as well as to her students. \u201cIt\u2019s really exciting to share what I\u2019ve been doing,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The exhibition will include \u201cWhale Boat\u201d and three other 10-foot works; the four-foot-tall swimmer drawings from Budapest; and large, 3-D-printed sculptures and other pieces from her \u201cOcean Bodies\u201d series. \u201cThe scale is important,\u201d Callas says, \u201cbecause I want people to be immersed in the imagery.\u201d She hopes to provide \u201ca psychological experience,\u201d prompting viewers to think about their own connections to other species and the ocean.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In talking about her work, Callas often calls it \u201cuniting facts with feelings.\u201d That, along with her personal connection to nature, is what drives her in all of this. \u201cWe have the science,\u201d she says, \u201cbut people don\u2019t act out of knowledge. They act out of feeling. To bring the facts and the feelings together is a big part of what I want to do in my art, my classes, and my Ecological Self work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m not merely aiming to illustrate nature,\u201d she continues, \u201cI\u2019m interested in exploring our emotional attachments to nature and the process of how we create meaning out of the natural world.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Associate Professor Kimberly Callas\u2019 latest project merges art and science to highlight our oceans\u2019 hidden depths and ecological significance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":19757,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"image_focus":"{\"x\":66,\"y\":36}","hide_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[91],"class_list":["post-19747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","tag-alumni-student-faculty"],"thumbnail":"\"\"","catString":"Features","issue":"Spring\/Summer 2024","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/60"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19747"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19747\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19913,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19747\/revisions\/19913"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19757"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}