Susan Ossman
Gather Wood, Gather Words was first inspired by a trip to Northern Morocco in 1991. I was awed by the relentless work of women gathering wood for their cook stoves. As they trekked across the vast green hills, their reda nd white mendil (skirts) seemed to paint the landscape. When I returned home to Casablanca, the image of them stitching the land they traversed inspired me to sketch, paint and stitch. Since that time, red threads and gestures of gathering wood have inspired artworks in which I reflect on how all work, with wood or words, goes up in smoke. Most recently, I developed a site-specific exhibition at the Tangiers American Legation Museum. i collarboated with Ayoub Lahlou and the momkin collective on a performance that enlivened the entire museum with the themes of the Exhibition.
In 2022, I began new fieldwork in the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia in collaboration with William R. Duell and James D. Faubion. Exploring logging and declining paper mills in isolated communities in the American South led me to enter natural and social environments that were entirely new to me. It led me to paint in tandem with James Faubion's poetry and work as a dramaturge for the play by WR Duell wrote based on our fieldwork. Wordsmyth Theater Company in Houston presented a staged reading in April 2024. A full production is in the works for 2025.
In April 2025, Ram Natarajan,Kim Robertson, and Andreas Valentin will present work we developed in India, Morocco, the Amazon, the UAE and the USA.
Gather Wood, Gather Words
Opening: April 16, 6pm
Symposium: April 19, 2-5 pm
Rizq Art initiative,
Leaf Building, Reem Island, Abu Dhabi
“Gather Wood, Gather Words’ is the fruit of collaboration focused on the action of gathering to study human rapports to one another and the Earth. Prefacing concepts or topics with an attention to movement, the artists sought to bridge divides of manual and intellectual labor, nature and culture. Their works are equally inspired by the ceaseless women gathering wood for village cookstoves or bundling rice to bring to market as by the plants they collect or the rustle of the desert winds that fertilize the Amazon with Saharan sand. Attention to bindings leads to reflections on how words gathered as law or tradition shape human fortunes and bodies as they do the natural world.
Curated by Meena Vari
Assistant Curator: Malavika S.