OCEANFRONT — Artists, scholars and more responded to the work of the renowned visual artist Maya Lin on Thursday, July 7, at Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art during a program that spoke to our environment, our histories and the waters we share.
It was a poetry reading, in part, but it was more, with a number of multidisciplinary speakers providing brief remarks about the health of our waterways, and there was song and verse.
The poet and educator Dr. Luisa A. Igloria, who until recently served as the commonwealth’s poet laureate, opened and concluded the evening with readings from a cycle of poems created in response to an exhibition of Lin’s work, “A Study of Water,” which remains on display at the museum through Sunday, Sept. 4.
The poem, in part: “It rains every afternoon now. Then flash / floods at intersections. Parked cars can float / away on just three inches of water.” And also: “We let the children run into the foam, / then pack wet sand into plastic pails. Four / molds connected by walls can make a fortress.”
Hofmann spoke about sculpture by Lin that demonstrates the connectivity of the waters, land and watershed, which “shows the difficulty of recognizing where the parts start and where they end.” She read from an essay that linked the history of the bay and its connections to the people who depend upon it, past and present.
The bay, she said, is experiencing climate change and issues such as sea level rise, among other challenges. And this is changing it.
“We have not been good stewards of Chesapeake waters and its resources,” she said. “Can we change this? Well, yes, I think we can.”
Dr. Deidre Gibson, chair of the department of marine and environmental science at Hampton University, discussed seeking information about her family’s history – and how the exhibit led to her to reflect on the migration of her African ancestors across the Atlantic, some leaving traces there and beyond.
“Our traces were left behind in South America as we made another flow to Louisiana and Virginia,” she said.
Suping Li, an architect who has worked on a range of award-winning projects and serves on Norfolk’s architectural review board, spoke about dealing with water issues in design.
“The goal is to keep water as our friend,” she said, speaking of coexisting with it.
Lin may be known to many people for her design of the Vietnam Veteran Memorial in Washington, D.C., but she has a long career as an architect and visual artist, with her work shown around the world.
Learn more about the exhibition online at virginiamoca.org.
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