"UNEARTHED" - AN Art Exhibit on until november 5, 2011

The museum is currently featuring an “Extreme Fabric Art Exhibit” by Patricia Chauncey, an extreme textile artist. The exhibit has been designed and made specifically for the Britannia Mine Museum with fabric pieces manipulated with fire and rocks.

The UNEARTHED Exhibit in the historical Machine Shop. Photo credit: Krisztina Egyed.

The Britannia Mine Museum is interested in providing diverse ways for audiences to connect with and understand why mining is relevant to them.

Patricia Chauncey is an extreme textile artist who transforms the surfaces of ordinary white cloth by using her own experimental and de-structive techniques that she has developed over the past decade. Through her art Patricia creates a personal vocabulary to communicate her obsession with the natural world. Her chosen methods are reflective of the huge range of activity and exploration present in contemporary art practice.

UNEARTHED by Patricia Chauncey is a sensitive body of work inspired by the physical attributes of the Britannia Mine site. The individual works examine the processes and interactions of the geological materials of mining, the human interventions, as well as connects us emotionally to the memory of the people who had dedicated much of their lives here and who have left their marks inside the mine itself. The triptych Sacrifice embodies all of these elements. The large 3 panel piece has undergone extreme processes using copper, iron and plants from the area. It is suspended ghostlike in the air, suggesting memory, and is intended to disintegrate and vaporize over time as the exhibit progresses, thus becoming a meaningful metaphor for the transformation that is constantly taking place above and beneath the surface of the earth.

By unearthing the Britannia Mine Patricia Chauncey reveals a deeper understanding of our connections to the earth and the spirit of mining.

From the Guest Art Curator, Krisztina Egyed

Video and interview with artist, Patricia Chauncey (below).