Virginia MOCA to premiere multiple original works inspired by the region
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. – The Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art (Virginia MOCA) announces the exhibition Maya Lin: A Study of Water, featuring new and selected works from American artist, designer and activist Maya Lin. Lin began her internationally renowned career with her design of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. The exhibition will be on view from April 21 through Sept. 4, 2022 at Virginia MOCA, the organizer and sole venue.
“Sitting at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay and the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, we feel incredibly fortunate to present beautiful and profound work by Maya Lin, a creative trailblazer, that helps illuminate the urgency of water issues in our community, across the country and around the world,” said Virginia MOCA Director and CEO Gary Ryan.
Maya Lin: A Study of Water continues the artist’s environmentally focused practice and brings together a selection of her interpretations of water with brand new, site-responsive works inspired by the Chesapeake Bay. The works evoke water’s many forms and patterns, including rivers and their rise, oceans and their tides, and icebergs and the detriment of their melting poses. Created with artistic intuition and scientific research, Lin’s works are compelling in both their beauty and their many meanings.
“Maya Lin: A Study of Water not only invites discovery but also encourages contemplation about the many ways in which we need water and manage its powerful bearings on our environment,” said guest curator Melissa Messina. “This is an exciting opportunity to bring Maya Lin’s ecologically-minded artwork to the region.”
The exhibition’s connections to the Chesapeake Bay region and Virginia Beach are expanded upon through the museum’s robust community engagement initiatives: an audio tour of Maya Lin: A Study of Water featuring voices of scientists, environmentalists and local students; an open call for a community exhibition and student sculpture garden of works inspired by Lin; and educational collaborations with a variety of organizations such as the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, WHRO Public Media and Virginia Beach City Public Schools.
What Is Missing?, an interactive multimedia installation that invites visitors to share memories and ecological perspectives, was established by Lin to raise awareness of the ongoing sixth mass extinction. Contributions from Virginia MOCA visitors will be collected and included in the ongoing project.
Maya Lin: A Study of Water will be accompanied by an exhibition publication, which will include a commissioned poem by Luisa Igloria, the Poet Laureate of Virginia, responding to the works in the exhibition.
A range of interdisciplinary public programs designed to engage visitors around the exhibition’s themes will include:
- Guest curator conversation with Melissa Messina in June.
- Gallery talk and reading of commissioned poem in July.
- Monthly Coffee + Conversation, Looking to Learn (ages 3-8) and Instagram Live Chats throughout the run of the exhibition. A complete schedule is available at virginiamoca.org.
Maya Lin: A Study of Water is supported in part by presenting sponsor Dominion Energy. Free admission to the exhibition is made possible by the Goode Family Foundation. Additional support comes from the City of Virginia Beach, The Batten Foundation, Sentara Healthcare, McKenzie Construction Corporation, The Brock Foundation, Suzanne and Vince Mastracco, Arleen Cohen and Family, Susan and Andy Cohen, Andrew and Barbara Fine, Susan and Craig Grube, Steve Lawson and Vivian Montano, Meredith and Brother Rutter, Shavrick & Partners, The Vandeventer Family Foundation in memory of Ann Vandeventer, Linda H. Kaufman, Allison Whitmore, The Runnymede Corporation, Betty Darden, Tom and Alison Johnson, The Esther and Alan Fleder Foundation, Virginia Commission for the Arts, Business Consortium for Arts Support and the City of Portsmouth.
About Maya Lin
One of the most renowned visual artists of our time, Maya Lin is the recipient of the National Medal of Arts (2009) and the Presidential Medal of Freedom (2016). Throughout her 40-year career melding fine art, architecture and design, Maya Lin has connected themes of the environment, memory, loss and advocacy. After completing the Vietnam Veterans Memorial (1982), the Civil Rights Memorial (1989) in Montgomery, Alabama and the Women’s Table (1993) at Yale University, Lin turned her creative attention to a range of art and design projects. Among Maya Lin’s notable site-specific sculptures, earthworks and architecture projects are Ghost Forest (2021), an installation in Madison Square Park, New York; the Neilson Library at Smith College (2021), Northampton, Massachusetts; Museum of Chinese in America (2009) in New York; and Storm King Wavefield (2009) at Storm King Art Center, New Windsor, New York. mayalinstudio.com
About Guest Curator Melissa Messina
Melissa Messina is an independent curator, curatorial advisor and curator of the Mildred Thompson Estate. For over 15 years, her exhibitions and public programs have been presented in cultural institutions throughout the U.S. and around the world. She has curated solo shows for such esteemed women sculptors as Lynda Benglis, Chakaia Booker, Ebony G. Patterson, Shinique Smith and Ursula Von Rydingsvard. Messina has worked on site-responsive projects with the artists Natasha Bowdoin, Kendall Buster, Ingrid Calame, Teresita Fernandez, Wayne Gonzalez, Trenton Doyle Hancock, Nicola López, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Jason Middlebrook and Nate Young. messinacuratorial.com
About the Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art
An AAM accredited non-collecting museum, Virginia MOCA presents exceptional, locally relevant and nationally resonant exhibitions that invite neighbors, strangers, students, families, communities and cultures to explore our shared humanity through contemporary art, in all of its timeliness, restlessness and beauty. More information about Virginia MOCA can be found at virginiamoca.org.
This piece was prepared online by Panuruji Kenta, Publisher, SEVENSEAS Media