“I’m very thankful for the opportunity. It’s exciting. It’s an honor,” said Collopy. “This is the first time SOS ART and the Fitton Center have had an artist-in-residence. This is the first time I’ve been an artist-in-residence. I love the connection between art organizations and social justice. Both are really about community.”
Collopy, a Darrtown resident, who teaches a Creative Aging Painting class at the Fitton Center, began her three-month residency on April 1. The position will run through the end of June.
“When I read about the artist-in-residence program, I thought to myself, I have a connection because I have experienced food insufficiency and hunger when I was younger. My family grew up in poverty. I also hadn’t done an artist residency before or had the opportunity to do so, but I knew I would enjoy working with the Fitton Center and SOS ART,” Collopy said.
Collopy will be working with the theme of Food Insufficiency/Hunger to create new works, and she will also teach a free workshop at the Fitton Center on Saturday, May 4, from noon to 3 p.m. on how to make collage art related to the theme. Participants will learn to make collages using food wrappings, boxes and magazine cut-outs of food. The workshop is free, but registration is required.
Collopy will create a series of five to 10 acrylic-on-linen paintings during her residency titled You Are NOT What You Eat, specifically still-life paintings of the food often consumed by disadvantaged people. Think of convenient and affordable items like generic brands, spoiled fruits and vegetables sold at a discount or fast food.
The hunger theme resonated with Collopy on a personal level.
“Having experienced poverty as a child and into adulthood, I understand the shame of not having adequate resources to buy nutritional foods,” she said. “The feeling of hunger and the dependency on government subsidies was the norm in my family. I always had the blue lunch ticket, different than the yellow of my fellow classmates.
She said a million people in Ohio are food insecure, including 380,000 children.
She does not want the work to be too depressing.
“I try to have a balance. Some of it’s going to be colorful and fun. Even though the content might not be joyful and light, I still try to bring a vibrant energy and style to the paintings,” she said.
“It’s my hope to inspire a relief of this shame that is stigmatized by the consuming of the less-than-desired foods caused by not having the regional availability — living in a food desert — or the resources available to afford healthy foods,” said Collopy.
“This is a way to amplify the voices of artists in the Greater Cincinnati area who are interested in promoting themes of peace and justice in their work,” said Kate Rowekamp, director of education and outreach at the Fitton Center.
She said artists who apply for the artist-in-residence program can choose any theme related to peace and justice that they want to focus on or one that resonates the most with them.
“We have an event coming up with SOS ART for World Hunger Day, so we were asking for proposals based on hunger and food insufficiency, and that’s where Chrissy’s pitch came in,” said Rowekamp.
She said the idea for the residency is to provide the artist with time and resources to create whatever kind of art that is their chosen media. It’s not just limited to visual artists, but it can also be for filmmakers, writers, or any creative pursuit.
Collopy will create a body of work that can be shared with the community. She will also teach a community workshop to further communicate the theme.
The first public viewing of the paintings will be held on May 28 – World Hunger Day – at the Mount Auburn Presbyterian Church, 103 William Howard Taft Road, Cincinnati.
Cincinnati-based SOS ART encourages, promotes and provides opportunities and venues for the arts as dynamic vehicles for peace and justice, for change, and for a better world.
Founder Saad Ghosn said funding from the estate of Gloria McConnaghy — the late artist, collector and original proprietor of The Little Mahatma shop in Cincinnati was a dedicated supporter of SOS ART — enabled the creation of the artist-in-residence program. He said working with the Fitton Center was a logical step to amplify the impact of her gift.
“I very much appreciate all the interactions we’ve had with the Fitton Center over the years,” said Ghosn. “The connection is strong. We don’t really have a gallery space of our own. For these artists in residence, we’ve committed to showing their work, so we wanted to partner with somebody who had the capacity to do that.”
While both SOS and the Fitton Center offer limited studio space for the resident artist, there is flexibility. Collopy will be doing much of her work from her home studio.
“Hunger is an important issue,” said Ghosn. “She really hit the spirit of what the residency is trying to accomplish. All the work we do is to empower our local artists to use their voice, their creativity, to start conversations about important issues.”
Collopy’s You Are NOT What You Eat paintings, as well as pieces by the collage workshop participants, will appear together in an exhibition in the Community Gallery at the Fitton Center in June. Guests will be invited to bring non-perishable food items for donation to area food banks.
Additionally, Collopy currently has works on display at Cincinnati’s Contemporary Art Center in the Region 90 “Connections” exhibit, located in the community gallery. She will also have several collage pieces in the Fitton Center’s 30th Anniversary Member Show, which will open on Sat., May 11 and run through Fri., July 12. Connect with Chrissy Collopy on Instagram @sapphiresunfish.
For more information or to apply to be the next artist-in-resident, visit the Fitton Center/SOS ART artist-in-residence web page at fittoncenter.org. The next application deadline is May 1 (for a July-Sept. 2024 residency.) This is a quarterly residency, and the goal is to have four artists serve as an artist-in-residence in the first year.
