Holding Water

Dilip da Cunha writes in The Invention of Rivers that now a "water ethos" is needed, where water is the measure and instrument of spatial and social organization: A water ethos indicates a fundamental immersion in water with anthropological and sociological significance. A measure of water will have to consider the following: Water creates a paradox, water is a paradox. There is often in deltaic places too much water, and there is often too little water. Water purifies, water needs to be purified. Once water was needed to purify everything, and now water needs to be purified before anything can be done with it. Water disorients and reorients. It’s an agent of transformation, of fluctuations and inversions and as a consequence, generator of ambiguities. Water in the everyday dry domain can disrupt normality and produce new social and political realities. Water assures neither terra nor firma. Water challenges taking for granted the fact that land is ground. In a new constitution of ground, we will have to develop new terms of reference, such as the following: Immersion. Buoyancy. Drift. Level. Depth. Fluidity. Floatation. Ebb. Tide. Rhythm.

This exhibition of new artwork is a living archive of the physical--geological and bodily-- experiences and processes of water in our local watershed and waterways. Mattingly reflects that “here, water is volatile, fragile, violent, serene, elusive, ubiquitous, nourishing, devastating, in need of protection, and fundamental to life.” Mattingly reflects that here, water is volatile, fragile, violent, serene, elusive, ubiquitous, nourishing, devastating, in need of protection, and fundamental to life. 

Mattingly has built sculptural ecosystems that prioritize access to food, shelter, and clean water, resulting in large-scale participatory projects around the world. In 2016, Her floating sculpture and edible landscape on a barge in New York, Swale, depended upon water common law and inspired NYC Parks to establish their first public "Foodway". Mattingly’s artwork has been exhibited at institutions including Storm King Art Center, the International Center of Photography, Seoul Art Center, the Brooklyn Museum, Palais de Tokyo, Barbican Art Gallery, and Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Havana. Notable grants include the Guggenheim Foundation Grant, the James L. Knight Foundation, the Harpo Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts, and the Jerome Foundation. She has been featured in various documentaries and publications, including Art21 and The New York Times. -Katherine Carl, Curator