Of the Earth

Inspired by Oliver Sacks' love of the periodic table (as later beautifully expressed in his essay "My Periodic Table" in the New York Times, July 24, 2015):

"Times of stress throughout my life have led me to turn, or return, to the physical sciences, a world where there is no life, but also no death."

Excerpt from the Annual State of the Art Member Show Review

Ithaca Times : Entertainment Section

by Amber Donofrio May 22, 2015

Jan Kather’s Of the Earth is another statement piece in the show, alluding to the connection between the environment and scientific knowledge, while also emphasizing their mental and physical separation. Purveyed through a metal print, the image is a nature scene of rocks and grass surrounding a brownish pond, a tree reflected in its waters. The Periodic Table of Elements is overlaid on the pond, its rigid lines contrasting against the more uneven balance of the earth’s natural (visual) composition. And yet, these elements are the words and symbols given to the components of the land we see, in all of its imperfections and tangibility. There’s a divorce between things’ explanations and their literal presence, “things” referring to everything existing within our physical reality: the Finger Lakes, dust on our shoes, air, sunshine. It is all the Earth, and the Earth, ourselves included, is composed of smaller elements that constitute the whole, somehow forming and emitting from one another in an ecosystem so large and complex it’s impossible to fathom in its entirety.