In Medina, a blink-and-you'll-miss-it town in Western New York, an art show is tackling something huge: how we survive when resources are, well, finite. Forget your typical doomsday eco-art. "All That Sustains Us," a triennial exhibition, isn't here to bum you out. It's here to make you think about everything you take for granted, from the sweater on your back to the water in your tap.
The show kicks off with Mierle Laderman Ukeles, the kind of artist who makes you wonder why no one else thought of it first. Her video features the Manifesto for Maintenance Art, 1969!, a document that basically says, "Hey, someone's gotta do the dishes." Ukeles spent 40 years as an unpaid artist-in-residence for the New York Department of Sanitation, turning the invisible labor of upkeep into, you guessed it, art. Because apparently, that's where we are now.
Unpacking Our Everyday
Many of the artists dig into the origins of our stuff, often with a wry twist:
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Clothes: Victoria-Idongesit Udondian literally trades new coats for old work clothes from immigrant textile workers, then turns the worn garments into sculptures. It’s a stylish way to highlight global supply chains and the hands that make our threads.
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Food: Deirdre O’Mahony interviewed Irish farmers whose lives got kneecapped by capitalism, then turned their stories into a song. Because if you can’t beat ’em, at least you can set their struggles to music over drone footage of their fields.
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Energy: Michael Wang created "Sugar Bush Energy," a natural energy drink from local maple syrup. It's a shout-out to the "think global, act local" mantra, and a nod to local abolitionists who once boycotted sugar for, you guessed it, maple.
Then there's Dionne Lee, whose analog photos of spiraled rocks are less about Instagram and more about actual survival skills. Because knowing how to navigate by stone might just come in handy when your phone dies.
Community, Beavers, and Buckingham Palace
The exhibition isn't confined to a stuffy gallery. It sprawls across Medina, popping up in a church, a train station, and even a YMCA. This gives the whole thing a charming, small-town vibe, which is a nice change from the usual big-city art scene.
Collaboration is a big theme, sometimes with unexpected partners. Aki Inomata’s installation features wood gnawed by beavers. Yes, beavers. She even named the ones who helped her from a Tokyo Zoo. Meanwhile, Anne Duk-Hee Jordan built a barnacle-shaped sculpture that filters rainwater for birds and bees using biochar. Because who doesn't need a fancy barnacle-sculpture-slash-water-filter?
And then there's the Erie Canal, which runs right through it all. Asad Raza actually rerouted canal water into the main exhibition hub, inviting visitors to wade in. And James Beckett installed chunks of Medina sandstone, the very stuff used to build parts of Buckingham Palace, in front of the old high school. These majestic rocks will slowly erode, a slow-motion art piece showing nature's relentless patience.
This triennial is part of a broader effort to "revitalize the Erie Canal," which, let's be honest, could use a little love. And while the word "gentrification" might make some wince, the show manages to be focused and meaningful without overwhelming you with, well, too much art.
"All That Sustains Us" is a rare beast: an "eco art" survey that actually gets it. It understands that "eco" means "ecosystem," and that our ecosystem is literally everything. Which, if you think about it, is both impressive and slightly terrifying.
