Fiber and Fungi in the Schuylkill Center Art Gallery
January 12, 2016
PHILADELPHIA, PA � Acclaimed Philadelphia artist Melissa Maddonni Haims and her husband Josh Haims are bringing their art to the Schuylkill Center�s environmental art gallery for The Foragers, a celebration of wild mushrooms and the forest ecosystem. Opening on Thursday, January 28, The Foragers is both whimsical and delicate. Richly colored artworks seem to float in the open gallery, creating the impression of small windows into the vibrant forest floor. In fiber sculpture and photographs, the show explores how nature can create something from almost nothing.
Artists Melissa and Josh have long been mesmerized by mushrooms. Early in their relationship, Josh recommended that they go mushroom foraging in Fairmount Park. Having never been mushroom foraging before, the two stumbled over rocks and downed wood in the forest near the Valley Green Inn in the Wissahickon, searing for fungi. What seemed frivolous and foolish at first, drew the artists into a deep, 20-year exploration of forest mycology.
Josh�s photographs bring these mushrooms to saturated, luminescent life. The images glow in warm hues, minute details from the forest floor illuminated and celebrated. The photographs capture a perfect stillness, moments of time frozen, and at the same time demonstrate living energy embodied. For Melissa, mushrooms have represented a journey in biomimicry. Inspired by the forms of these fungi, Melissa creates crochet mushrooms and assembles forest tableaus using bark and wood foraged in local forests.
The Schuylkill Center invites the public to join Melissa and Josh for the opening of The Foragers on Thursday, January 28, at 6 pm. Melissa will also offer a mushroom crochet workshop on February 20th , to show participants how to create their own fiber fungi.
For more information on the artists, visit: http://www.haimshaus.com/
About the Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education
The Schuylkill Center was founded in 1965 as the nation�s first urban environmental education center. Its 365-acres of fields and forests serve as a living laboratory to foster appreciation, deepen understanding, and encourage stewardship of the environment. Reaching over 36,000 Philadelphia-area residents each year, the Schuylkill Center offers a diverse collection of educational programs, including programs for school, continuing education for teachers, Pennsylvania�s first Nature Preschool, and a full calendar of events for the public.
