Past Featured Exhibitions

In September 2020, the Holiday Farm Fire, driven by fierce east winds, burned 173,000 acres along the forested McKenzie River canyon in the Cascade Range of Oregon. Two months later, in an impulsive response, photographer David Paul Bayles and disturbance ecologist Frederick Swanson began a photography project to document the stark beauty of the burned forest and its vibrant response to fire.

Painted over a ten-year period, artist Suze Woolf captures the unusual beauty of the fire-carved snags, known as “totems,” from all over the North American West. Suze’s original paintings have been digitally reproduced at full size on multiple layers of fabric. Fourteen of the trees have companion “story trees,” written by author Lorena Williams, white text on black shapes that correspond to the trees they reference.

Through the intersection of art and science, this exhibit invites visitors to explore the idea that forests and fire are not opposed, but rather part of the same continuous cycle. The exhibit explores the ecological role of fire and the human impacts behind the rise of large and severe wildfires. Arizona-based artist Bryan David Griffith used fire itself to create paintings, sculptures, and large-scale art installations for this exhibition.