Hope Chest: Open Terrain
Hope Chest is an ongoing series by Becky Alley that engages the southern American tradition of preparing a young girl for her future as a wife and mother. As a mother of young children, Alley contemplates preparing them for an uncertain future. Countering conventional gender norms associated with hope chests, Alley combines typical hope chest contents (quilts, weavings, bed linens, books, and cedar) with materials and objects of crisis and survival (tarps, emergency blankets, paracord, sandbags, and utility tape). Ultimately, the work simultaneously speaks to her fears and worries about the world her children will someday inherit, speculating on impending disaster and the inevitability of loss, while also exhibiting qualities like flexibility, adaptability, resilience, and play that she hopes will help them navigate the world to come. This particular iteration, Hope Chest: Open Terrain, is presented in an outdoor art venue opening up a community space for contemplating a shared vision and hope for our future in light of the many challenges we have from climate disasters to growing socio-economic inequality.
This installation is part of Terrain Biennial 2023 and was co-curated by Miriam Kienle and Josh Porter. It will be on display at the Lexington Art League from October 1 - November 15, 2023.
Terrain Exhibitions is pleased to announce the 6th edition of our grassroots public art festival. Terrain Biennial 2023 will bring public art to neighborhoods around the world from October 1 – November 15, 2023.
Artists and curators collaborated with hosts to produce art installations (think sculptures, paintings, projections, flags, yarn art, you name it!) outside their homes (and other surprising spots!). Over 200 Terrain projects will be popping up on front lawns (and porches, windows, and rooftops, too!) around Chicagoland, across the country, and even all over the world for anyone who walks, rolls, skips or wanders by to discover.
This year, artists responded to the theme mycelium connection to honor and expand our mission of making unexpected, yet vital human and environmental connections. Mycelium is a thriving underground network of fungal threads, vital to many natural ecosystems. Despite its enormous geographical span, it remains invisible to most, subversively springing up from cracks and shadows. We ask ourselves, who and what has been overlooked, and why?
Terrain Biennial began in 2013 on a single block in Oak Park, IL and has spread across redlining from Chicago to India and everywhere in between. Much like a mycelium bloom, we continue to creatively decentralize.
About THe Artist
Becky Alley is an artist, curator, creative collaborator and educator. Her artwork is process and materials focused, often utilizing traditional craft media and commonly recognizable objects. Themes of enduring interest are ritual, legacy, empathy, decay, and loss. She loves collaboration and, through her creative work, is particularly interested in expanding the roles of self-reflection and meaning in everyday life.
Alley earned her BFA in Printmaking/Drawing from Washington University (2000) and her MFA in Studio Art from the University of Kansas (2005). In 2017 she was named the inaugural Kentucky Fellow as a finalist in the Southern Prize, and in recent years has been awarded numerous research travel grants from the Great Meadows Foundation. In 2018 she was awarded an Artist Enrichment Grant from Kentucky Foundation for Women to create new work, and was featured in the national publication New American Painting published in 2020. She is currently a Lecturer/ Bolivar Art Gallery Director at the University of Kentucky.