Wendy Wahl

Wahl’s work has been shown nationally and internationally. It is in private and public collections including the Smithsonian’s Cooper Hewitt Museum and the Museum of Art at the Rhode Island School of Design. Solo exhibitions have been mounted at the Newport Art Museum in RI, the Fuller Craft Museum in MA, and the Grand Rapids Museum of Art in MI. Recent group exhibitions have included the European Cultural Center, Venice, Italy, A.I.R, NY, Jamestown Art Center, RI, and the Fitchburg Art Museum, MA. Platforms featuring her work have include Art News, Boston Globe, New York Times, Art New England, Casa Vogue, Providence Journal, Metropolis, Architectural Digest, The New Yorker, the Britannica blog, the Curated Object, New England Home, Arttextile, Artsper, MutualArt and Artnet.  Wendy was documented for Networks RI and has received artist fellowship awards from the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts. The US Ambassador to Tashkent, Uzbekistan selected her work for his residence through the Art in Embassy program and an image of one of her installations was used for the cover of Overwhelmed, Princeton Press. Wahl’s work is represented by BrownGrotta Arts, Wilton, CT, Kaller Fine Arts, Washington, DC, and at wendywahl.com

Artist Statement

In 2016 I returned to Hera as an artist board member because it offers an opportunity to be part of a feminist art organization that serves the community and to exhibit locally. The work I plan to present is from a series that began in 2010 called myceliology. It is inspired by and defined as an aesthetic exploration of the Fungi Kingdom. To understand this weird and wonderful world of interconnectedness I turned to mycologist Paul Stamets and anthropologist Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing, among others. The Fungal Kingdom is a powerful presence in the circle of life, considered nature’s internet, and it turns out we need them though they don’t need us.  When I began drawing with mushroom spores I found their marks crossed terrestrial, celestial, and aquatic realms. I remember thinking they were inviting me to draw.  The process included collecting and growing mushrooms, printing the spores, then adding my hand directly and digitally to create prints from the original drawings. These orbs are some of the earliest experiments.