Research Mission
What is Unseen California’s AIR Program?
Unseen California, a research initiative at UC Santa Cruz, that provides artists with a supportive Artist-in-Residence AIR program that aims to deepen an artist's way of knowing the shifting California landscape. Our program supports artists in the creation of new artworks and pairs artists with unique public programming opportunities through an established partnership with the University of California’s Natural Reserve System (UCNRS) and UCSC’s Norris Center for Natural History. This collaboration creates a unique opportunity to amplify artists’ voices and provide a platform for diverse perspectives on pressing environmental issues.
Learn more about the University of California Natural Reserve System (UCNRS) and each field site in California here: https://ucnrs.org/by-name/
Unseen California’s AIR mission
It is Unseen California’s mission to support emerging/ mid-career artists and to highlight the indispensable role artists play in representing our relationships with the natural world. It aims to contribute to the ecological understanding of California and the Earth by establishing and advocating for the vital role the arts can play in our climate-impacted future.
Unseen California at UCSC activates the lands of the entire UCNRS, facilitating their use as an artistic space in a new way. Unseen California collaborates with AIR as they engage with California landscapes to inspire their creative practice and examine some of its most pressing associated topics such as: climate, weather, Indigenous relearning, survival, land stewardship, senses of belonging, and more-than-human species futures.
About the University of California Natural Reserve System
The UCNRS consists of 43 sites across California encompassing 47,000 acres of land with over 50 miles of protected coastline. The mission of the UCNRS is to contribute to the understanding and stewardship of the Earth and its natural systems by supporting research, teaching, and outreach to the public. Due to the reserves’ designation as research sites, Unseen California artists working in the reserves have the unique opportunity to be in conversation and collaboration with science researchers, and to utilize the resources available at each reserve’s field station to support their fieldwork. No other field site network can match the size, scope, and ecological diversity of the UCNRS.
Who & What:
Curated from a range of artists working in collaboration with scientists, science-based humanities scholars, and community members, Unseen California invites us all to learn about ways in which the arts play an urgent role in addressing issues of access, equality, social, and environmental justice.
The artists are invited to collaborate with the natural world, scholars, and local community members to conduct their personal field studies and create new art works that engages with the topics and themes that emerge from their research relating to the California landscape(s.) Each artist researcher prioritizes on-site exploration and engagement with the unique ecology and scientific research at their chosen site(s).
What does Unseen California offer Artists-in Residence?
Unseen California provides artists with financial support, awarding artists with a research stipend of $10,000/year for two years (a total of 20K per artist). AIR will also have additional financial support of up to $1,000/year for facility/housing fees at their chosen UC Natural Reserve(s).
Unseen California’s AIR program is novel, as it offers artists a two-year residency, allowing artists to engage with their chosen UC Natural Reserve, or multiple reserves, over multiple seasons to foster long-term research relationships to site, place, and community. AIR are not tied to a work space or location but rather are able to move freely by visiting their chosen reserve site (this can be frequent and for longer periods of time) based on their research. For clarification, this program does not support a two year length residency stay/housing at a particular site.
Most (but not all) of the UC Natural Reserves provide researchers access to accommodations and/or on site facilities. See each field station website for facility accommodations information by researching the UCNRS website: https://ucnrs.org/find-a-reserve/
2024-2026 Research Cohort:
Shao-Feng Hsu and Lacey Lennon are our current artists-in-residence.
2021-2023 Inaugural Research Cohort:
Karolina Karlic, Dionne Lee. Mercedes Dorame, Tarrah Krajnak, Aspen Mays. Five women artists took part as the inaugural group of Artist Researchers working across the California landscape.
SFMoMA Archives visit with photography curator Dr. Shana Lopes and artist researchers Dionne Lee and Mercedes Dorame. 2022
Artist Researchers: Aspen Mays and Mercedes Dorame viewing a bald eagle nest.
Four major research themes:
1) the Decolonization of Western Arts Canons,
2) the Interpretation of Land as Nature, Wilderness, Reserve,
3) the notion of Sensing Place & Environment,
4) Imaging and SensingTechnologies relating to Earth Ecologies.
To address our research questions:
— How do we communicate Arts + Science-inspired stories to diverse 21st-Century audiences?
— How can Interdisciplinary Arts, Ecology, and Humanities teams address complex California problems?
— In what ways can Artists engage with the natural world in contemporary intriguing ways?
— What is the benefit of producing bodies of works which synthesize the Arts, Ecology, and the Humanities; and what can this synthesis accomplish ?
UC Natural Reserve Sites: