URI_Research_Magazine_2011-2012_Melissa-McCarthy

The Dynamic Connection Between Art and Science and the Ocean: Sea Grant Visual Arts Program

Not every university appreciates the dynamic connection between art and science, but the University of Rhode Island (URI) does. Since 1988, URI has awarded grants to visual artists and curators, who convey some aspect of the marine environment in their work under the Visual Arts Sea Grant Program. The program was created by URI oceanography professor Scott Nixon. Not a lot of money is awarded each year – just $3,000, in fact. But for a

group of professionals, who traditionally struggle to support themselves, the money can be helpful, noted Barbara Pagh, a professor of printmaking and two-dimensional art in URI’s department of art and art history, who administers the program with her colleague, Gary Richman. “It is, I think, an important grant,” said Pagh. Not only is the subject matter important, given the threats posed to Rhode Island’s coastal environment from climate change and other factors, but the encouragement it provides artists is significant, especially in these times of limited opportunities, she said. Over the years, the award has been given to artists working in a broad array of media, everything from photography to textiles to sculptures and installations. A panel of one faculty member from URI and two outside artists and/or curators select the winners, said Pagh, noting the panel reviews the art without knowing the artist. In 2010, two artists split the award; Marguerite White of Newton, Massachusetts, who teaches at the DeCordova Museum School and Worcester’s College of the Holy Cross, and Mary Giehl of Syracuse, New York, a part-time professor of textile and fiber arts at Syracuse University. White’s work includes an installation entitled “Cargo,” which will be viewed June 20 through July 18, 2012, in Nantucket. The installation used light and drawing in an historic sea captain’s house to explore commercial objects lost at sea. White’s work is generally inspired by the harbors of the

Gary Richman and Barbara Pagh

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