The gardenLab@516 / Season Two
April 2011

The GardenLab@516 enters it’s second growing season with a complete transformation of the lot. The winter Sky Mirrors installation has been dismantled and new planting beds have been turned.

Many items will leave 516 and become a part of a storefront installation in the West End to promote site reclamation and sustainable gardening practices in the West End neighborhoods.

A few items will stay including the plaster bust of the Indian brave and the plaster doll head molds. After a year exposed to natural elements, all of the plaster objects are aging nicely.

The GardenLab@516 facing an interesting circumstance this year. The building on the property of 516 (a.k.a. The Ruth Stanford House) which has sat unoccupied for many years, will undergo a complete renovation this year and become an satellite exhibition space of The Mattress Factory Museum. The contractor’s access route to the building is an element that needed to be considered in this year’s design of the garden space. Unsure of when the work will start, I have designed a garden space with both permanent and “portable” box planting elements. The plan is for the contractor and I to work together. As equipment is brought in and demolition gets underway, the portable box elements will be moved about the garden space and if needed they will be moved to the properties of my neighbors. (I have great neighbors!)

the winterGarden@516

the light throwing sculptures @ 516
wire, beveled glass, recovered metal · sizes variable · 2010



Light throwing sculptures in the GardenLab@516 hang at variable heights from wires strung between the Ruth Stanford House (516 Sampsonia) and Frank & Belle Battista’s house (Monterey). These sculptures are designed to dance with the wind while capturing and reflecting the light from the sun to the space below. These sculptures are symbols of appreciation — prayers of thanks — for the wind, for the the warmth and light of the sun, for friendship and community, and for the absolutely wonderful lesson-filled space I was given to work with.

the Sky Mirrors @ 516
mirrors, scrap tires, stone, sticks and an occasional found object or two · 6'w x 16'd

The Sky Mirrors are the primary sculpture in the center of the garden for the winter season. They bring the sky to the Earth to remind us to look up every once in a while and reflect on the greatness above.

The GardenLab@516 is a Mattress Factory installation at 516 Sampsonia Way in Pittsburgh PA. It is located next to the Ruth Stanford house and a few doors down from the Mattress Factory’s main building. An outdoor studio, garden and laboratory installation in the spring, summer and fall seasons, the gardenLab transforms into a light-throwing, mirror-reflecting reflection installation for the winter season.

The GardenLab@516 began in April 2010 and will go on at least into the spring of 2011. There is no end date at this point. It may see another growing season and continue into the fall of 2011.

“...so, what’s with the scary baby face molds?”

That’s the number one question of visitor’s in the GardenLab@516.

Long story short — I like to age white plaster objects by exposing them to natural elements for long periods of time. My interest in aging plaster in this manner started a long time ago with a plaster ballerina lamp. (See Ballerina In The Barn post 1.21.08)

I found these plaster molds in an alley outside of my former studio in the South Side. They had been out in the elements for a while were very damp. I thought they were creepy, but cool, and really shouldn’t be left to disintegrate in a pile of discarded trash. So I gathered them up, matching fronts with backs, brought them into my studio and placed them on a sunny windowsill to dry out. As they sat on the windowsill drying, quite a few visitors to my studio and were drawn to the plaster molds. Most people thought that there had to be a deep meaning attached to them — but really, there wasn’t.

I’m not sure if people understand when I tell them that their presence in the GardenLab@516 is simply to age the surface through time and exposure to the natural elements, and that the meaning and the physical state of these objects are currently in an embryonic stage. When these objects have aged appropriately, their meaning will be fully developed and they will become part of a future work.

The baby face molds seem to make people uneasy — and that I am sharing them in this public way makes me uneasy — because I can see that people are attaching a certain kind of meaning and importance to them that I feel doesn’t belong in this garden. I’ve contemplated removing them from the garden many times, but I have resisted this urge because the molds do need to incubate in the “laboratory” part of the garden space. They are still growing and it would be wrong to uproot them before they are mature.

the story behind the GardenLab@516’s Swiss Cheese Fence
22'w x 6'h · 2010

The GardenLab@516 started out as my private outdoor artist studio in a vacant lot on the North Side, but it didn’t stay private for long. The Mattress Factory Museum on Pittsburgh’s North Side generously gifted this unused and trash-ridden lot to me for use as an outdoor studio for the 2010 growing season. As I worked in the space, cleaning up trash, planting plants and making sculptural works, I noticed that passersby on Sampsonia Way were stopping and looking through the spaces in between the pickets to see what was going on in the lot. Often I’d say hello and we’d start a conversation. Soon a few neighborhood folks became “regular” visitors and it became clear to me that I needed to add a few peepholes to give these neighbors an opportunity to get a better sense of with what was happening in the space. The first holes were small; a dozen holes, seven-eighths of an inch in diameter. This was good. Then more people started to stop by because they noticed the newly drilled holes and then someone suggested that I add a few larger holes. So I did. I added 18 more holes, some 2 1/2" in diameter, some 3" in diameter. Now this was even better. Then the Mattress Factory tour groups started to stop and peek through the fence. Then people wanted to come in and the garden went public.

growing beans in circles @ 516

Green and yellow bean plants were planted around the five tire stacks that housed potatoes one though five in an attempt to keep the temperature of the soil inside the tire stacks cool.

The beans grew rapidly and produced an abundant crop.

stacked tires + tire stacks in the GardenLab@516

The Tire Stacks; One through Five / Recovered scrap tires are stacked to make a living sculpture that houses five potato plants.

(l) Stacked tire compost bins double as air drying station for salvaged oak planks, and (r) tires in waiting in the garden’s courtyard.

Safe Haven
barn wood (yellow pine and chestnut) and piano keys
96"h x 12"w x 112"l · 2010
























It was the magnitude of the twisted pile of debris that first drew me to the site of the collapsed barn on my family’s farm. The massive Pennsylvania Bank barn that had stood steadfast for over 120 years, now lay in pieces on the ground.

It was the individual beauty of the barn’s wood siding, exposed a century of environmental conditions that repeatedly drew me back.

“Safe Haven” is my visual response to a place of my past, that is now at it’s end. Through the work of salvaging what could be considered reusable in the debris of the barn, I found the seeds of a new beginning. A new beginning that started by letting go of the past.

An Experiment in Complicating Simplicity;
Alternative Methods of Watering Plants
assemblage of found objects, water (salt, fresh, pond), plants (garlic, grass, paperwhites) and dirt
sizes vary 18' to 30"h x 10" to 14"w x 10" to 14"d · 2010

The three alternate methods explored in this work: (1) evaporation, condensation and precipitation of salt water; (2) solid to liquid states of fresh water; and (3) capillary action with pond water.

water in the basement
275 plastic jugs, water, cardboard, ashes and basement dirt
recreation of actual event · 2010

My mother fought a life-long battle with major depression. Over a thirty-year period she became increasingly anxiety-ridden and panic-driven. The end of the world was of constant concern to her and she went to great lengths to be prepared for this event. During the time period of 1998-2000, she frantically prepared for Y2K, stockpiling food and water in the basement of her home.

When my mother was placed in a long-term health facility in 2006,
I started the task of cleaning out her estate. I rarely went into the basement and had long forgotten about her manic panic-driven behavior during the two years prior to 1.1.2000.

Then I came upon the water jugs — at least 200 of them, all clearly marked Y2K, covered with a layer of basement dust and dirt.

To my mother, these water jugs were objects of comfort. They helped to keep her panic and anxiety at bay. But to me, upon discovering them six and a half years after the fear of Y2K had passed, in the emptiness of a cold dark corner of her basement, they were just a reminder of the power of a horrible illness that shows no mercy to it’s victim.

In the last days of January 2010, I recreated the Y2K water jug scene/experience that I found in my mother’s basement in the dirty and gritty basement of Fe Gallery in Pittsburgh, PA. The installation of “water in the basement” began with clearing the gallery’s long and narrow basement of it’s possessions to create a large, cold, empty space. Then I salvaged empty milk jugs from my local Starbucks’ recycling bin, cleaned, removed their dairy labels and re-labeled 275 jugs with the tag of Y2K. I filled and partially-filled the jugs with water and placed them on a series of built cardboard shelves in the far end of the gallery’s basement. I dusted the entire installation with dirt and ashes from my mother’s basement, and sprayed several areas of the shelving with water to weaken the strength of the cardboard with the intention of causing sagging and collapse to the shelving system. (This worked beautifully.) The entire basement was dimly lit by one 35watt light bulb placed at the far end of the basement.

tape art dresses
work in progress 2009-2010

Three parts of an evolving (and revolving) work. Tape art dresses are part of a series of works that I refer to as the “cutting myself out of this fairy tale” series.

There will be several works in this series, most of which are in the planning and collecting of materials stages. “He Loves Me” (exhibited at Fe Gallery in Pittsburgh PA) is the first finished work in this series.

the farm · eighty-four pa
foundation wall, field stone, brick, block and timbers

Salvaged materials for two land art projects that I will start working on in the spring of 2010. The location is at my family’s farm in 84, PA. The field stone lay hidden beneath a layer of dirt for close to 100 years and was recently discovered by my brother Tom when he leveled the raised ramp that led to the second floor of the now dismantled Pennsylvania Bank style barn. The brick and block were originally salvaged by my Dad who was a bricklayer by trade.

what life gives
Eggshells, corrugated paper, found glass • 8'h x 10'w x 10'd
©2009 ROSE CLANCY

what life gives existed for three days as a site specific installation at The First Pittsburgh Visionary Arts Festival. Over the course of 27 hours, what life gives was open to foot traffic. Over 700 people walked through the installation, transforming a sea of jagged eggshell halves into a bed of softness that no longer maintained it’s identity as eggshells.

what life gives visually expressed my feelings about the difficulty of life’s journey and of the beauty found along the way. There is something inside of me that keeps me going. Often I do not know what that something is, I am just thankful that it is.

photo courtesy of Joey Kennedy

studio / summer 2009 / work in progress for the upcoming Pittsburgh Visionary Arts Festival / August 7, 8 and 9

studio / summer 2009 / work process

a bright blue cotton dress revisited (work in progress 2009)

A friend of mine gave me this dress form and a big box of blue and green surging thread. I looked at the thread cones and wondered how I could turn these cones of thread into a material that I could use to make art. I separated the cones by color and took inventory. Five cones of bright blue sat off by themselves on the table... and I thought “five strands into one... yeah, I can do something with that” , then my eyes traveled to the dress form and I knew what I would do. I will make a dress.

The first step is crocheting, and that is where I am now.

studio / summer 2009 / former living things

‘New Works’ Exhibition / Brew House Space 101

“when it rains” · layered paper (work in progress)

BLINDSIDED
paper, plants, dirt, water

The plants survived a month of neglect.

PLANNING
27ft w x 10ft h · paint, pencil

A 27' wall painted the color of sunshine, depicts the path of the Lincoln Highway, the path I will take when I start my journey west to Monterey CA. Inside the white line are my thoughts of how I came to make the decision to travel westward. Blindsided and Planning are related projects. I plan to create healing gardens as I travel across the US. A sculptural form similar to Blindsided will be the centerpiece of each garden and the sculpture will transform over the course of time. The thought I wish to share with others is that with time and reflection, life’s negatives can be turned into powerful positives.