smudge studio is a collaboration between Elizabeth Ellsworth and Jamie Kruse.
Our media include photography, performative research, multiples, installation and micro-productions. Inspired by both ancient and contemporary observations of Earth’s time and place in the cosmos, we stage embodied engagements with the planet’s ever-transforming events and conditions — human and nonhuman. We take this to be a vital aesthetic-ecological act.
BACKSTORY:
In 002005, Elizabeth Ellsworth and Jamie Kruse founded smudge studio as a 501c3 art and education nonprofit. Our first works used various media and hand-built devices that interacted with diverse landscapes and topographies in ways that signaled the dynamic forces shaping them.
We traveled nationally and internationally for several years to research landscapes in transformation, including the Nevada Test Site in 2009 via a Center for Land Use Interpretation (CLUI) residency in Wendover, UT. Through these travels we saw first hand how humans often design in ways that unintentionally create waste, rearrange landscapes and biospheres, and disrupt bio-geo networks. These impacts will shape our planet and our species and ramify into the future for thousands, and even millions of years. As these new material realities of climate change and the Anthropocene intensified, we expanded our framings of landscape and earth’s biosphere to include geologic time and geo-cosmo frames of reference.
To share this expanded frame, we founded the blog and project entitled Friends of the Pleistocene (002010). We used it to record and creatively respond to our observations and experiences as research artists. It led to our original publication entitled Geologic City: A Field Guide to the GeoArchitecture of New York (NYSCA funded 002012) and our co-edited collection of artists’ insights about the material conditions of contemporary life entitled Making the Geologic Now (punctum books 002012).
In May 002022, we launched smudge studio’s site-specific project: OBSERVATORY, located on the Penobscot Formation, in Belfast, Maine (158 High Street). OBSERVATORY is a geo-cosmo field station dedicated to making vast scales of geo | cosmo connection sense-able, meaningful, and livable at a human scale. In the midst of fast environmental change, OBSERVATORY’s mission is to generate experiences of curiosity, participation, and deep belonging to our home planet—and to its home, the cosmos.
Jamie Kruse is an artist and Assistant Professor at Parsons, The New School for Design (New York, NY). Her work has been supported by the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, Onion Foundation, The Puffin Foundation Ltd., The New School Green Fund (Office of Sustainability, The New School); New York State Council for the Arts, the Tishman Environment and Design Center and the Brooklyn Arts Council, among others. She has exhibited and presented her work both nationally and internationally. In the spring of 002014 she was a guest researcher for Future North (AHO Oslo) and in 002012, with Elizabeth Ellsworth, she co-edited Making the Geologic Now Responses to Material Conditions of Contemporary Life (punctum books). download CV
Elizabeth Ellsworth is one half of smudge studio, a 20-year trans-disciplinary
collaboration with Jamie Kruse. While a professor of media studies (University of
Wisconsin and The New School, New York), her scholarship focused on media, social
change, and public pedagogy. She is author of Places of Learning: Media, Architecture,
Pedagogy—an exploration of the power of aesthetic experience in noncompliantv
teaching and learning. Now she is engaged full time in smudge studio’s most recent
project: OBSERVATORY. Elizabeth’s media include letterpress, collage, fiber sculptures, photography, image-text juxtaposition, and tea as a means for social exchange.
smudge studio’s work has been supported by the Graham Foundation, Rauschenberg
Foundation, Nevada Museum’s Center for Art + Environment, Santa Fe Art Institute, and Research
Council of Norway, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity.
instagram: @observatorybelfast | MAKING THE GEOLOGIC NOW (punctum books) | vimeo | FOP BLOG | X @geoturn
Selected works are archived at the Center for Art + Environment, Nevada Museum of Art.
FULL project, publication and presentation list
SELECTED PROJECTS + EXHIBITIONS, 2010-present
002024
RISO RAMA, Weil Gallery, Corpus Christi, TX
02023
MOUNTAIN ENTERS ROOM, PLANET IS TEA ROOM, SPACE, window gallery, Portland, ME
Tea Leaves, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity project space, Banff, Alberta
Tea Hut of Miraculous Powers, Shed of the Tides, in collaboration with Waterfall Arts and Coastal Mountains Trust, Belfast, ME
002022
toofprints, documenta fifteen, in collaboration Alice Yard, Port of Spain, Trinidad/Kassel, Germany
Careful Infrastructures for Reassembled Lands, Toronto Waterfront Project, in collaboration with Lisa Hirmer
Solastalgic Archive (with Nina Elder), University of New Hampshire Museum of Art
002021
Drawing a Line to the Sun, Summer tea in Prospect Park, Nature Tea
002020
This Time With Tea, Summer Tea in Prospect Park (virtual)
Alchemy of Uncertainty, with The Alcyon Center, Mount Desert Island, ME (virtual)
002019
Cosmos Night: Flood of Light, Arts Letters and Numbers, Averill Park, NY
Deep Time Lab with Nina Elder, University of New Mexico Art Museum
Tea at the Tilt of the Earth, Henry Art Gallery, hosted by Cross-disciplinary Research Cluster on the Anthropocene, Washington University
002018
Power of Now, Pasquart Switzerland
Ambiguous Territory: Architecture, Landscape and the Postnatural, Pratt Manhattan Gallery + University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA
Field Remediations with Karolina Sobecka and The Cybernetics Library, Queens Museum, NY
002017
Incident Report: Reports, September Gallery, Hudson, NY
Ambiguous Territory: Architecture, Landscape and the Postnatural, University of Michigan, Taubman College Gallery
con•tin•u•ums (time beyond lifetimes), curated by Patrick Jaojoco, Pfizer Building, Brooklyn, NY
002016
toofprints, Alice Yard, Port of Spain, Trinidad
Open Studio, Rising Waters II (residency group exhibition), Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, Captiva, FLT
Amulets for the Anthropocene, Davies Forum Lecture, “Making Sense of the Anthropocene,” San Francisco University/Golden Gate Park
002015
From Trinity to Hiroshima and Beyond (Atomic Photographers Guild group exhibition), Old Bank of Japan, Hiroshima, Japan
Golden Spike: Rock Shop of the Anthropocene, Logan Square Comfort Station, Chicago, IL
Look Only at the Movement (solo show), Nevada Museum of Art, Center for Art + Environment
The Geologic Imagination: Sonic Acts Festival, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Uncovering Deep Time in Midtown: A Walking Tour, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, NY
002014
Inhabiting Change, small projects, Tromsø, Norway
Look Only at the Movement (solo show), Center for Land Use Interpretation, Wendover, UT + Santa Fe Art Institute, Santa Fe, NM
002013
Look Only at the Movement (solo show), Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, Parsons, The New School for Design, NY
Secret Wars, Proteus Gowanus, Brooklyn, NY
Field_Notes Deep Time, Art and Science Field Laboratory, Kilpisjärvi Biological Station, Finland and Finnish Academy of Fine Art
The Anthropocene Project, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, Germany
002012
Zuihitsu: Look Only at the Waves (solo show), Area Gallery, University of Southern Maine, Portland, ME
Thingness of Energy (solo show), Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, Parsons, The New School for Design, New York, NY
In the Interest of Time (solo show), Brazos Gallery, Richland College, Dallas, TX
Amulets for Infrastructure workshop, Kyoto University of Art and Design
Landscape Journeys (Reykjavik, Iceland), Oslo School of Architecture and Design, supported by Norwegian Research Council
Streaming Landscapes, Landscapes of Energy, Oslo School of Architecture and Design
002011
Geologic City pop-up exhibition and launch party, Studio-X, New York, NY
Artists in Residence for the US Government (Self-Declared), Institute for Wishful Thinking, Momenta Art, Brooklyn, NY
The Atlantic Cable, Incident Report, Hudson, NY
Musagetes September Cafe, Sudbury, Ontario
002010
Landscapes of Quarantine, Storefront for Art and Architecture, New York, NY, curated by Geoff Manaugh and Nicola Twilley
Geologic Time Viewer, humanities + digital visual interpretations conference, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MA
GRANTS AND AWARDS:
PUFFIN FOUNDATION, granted for OBSERVATORY, 2023
ONION FOUNDATION, granted for OBSERVATORY, 2023
HEMERA FOUNDATION, Tending Space Fellowship for Artists, Summer 2017, Spring 2018, Fall 2019
RESEARCH COUNCIL OF NORWAY, 2013-16, Guest Researchers Spring 2014
Granted for Future North, Project manager: Janike Kampevold Larsen, Oslo School of Architecture and Design
GRAHAM FOUNDATION FOR ADVANCED STUDIES IN THE FINE ARTS, 2012
Research and Development category, Granted for Repository: A Typological Guide to America’s Ephemeral Nuclear Infrastructure
NEW YORK STATE COUNCIL ON THE ARTS (NYSCA), Architecture Planning & Design, 2012
Granted for Repository: A Typological Guide to America's Ephemeral Nuclear Infrastructure
BROOKLYN ARTS COUNCIL regrant, New York Department of Cultural Affairs, 2011
Granted for Geologic City: A Field Guide to the GeoArchitecture of New York
NEW YORK STATE COUNCIL ON THE ARTS (NYSCA), Architecture Planning & Design program 2011
Granted for Geologic City: A Field Guide to the GeoArchitecture of New York
RESIDENCIES:
Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, Visual Arts Residency, Meeting for Teas, 2023
Fowler Dune Shack, Provincelands, MA, 2018
Santa Fe Art Institute, Santa Fe, NM Winter 2014, 2016, 2017
Rising Waters II, Rauschenberg Foundation, Captiva Island, FL, 2016
Phats Valley, Truro, Massachusetts 2014
Small Projects Gallery, Tromso, Norway 2014
Finnish Society of Bioart, Kilpisjärvi Biological Station, Finland 2013
Center for Land Use Interpretation (CLUI), Wendover, UT 2007, 2009, 2010
Cape Cod Modern House Trust (CCMHT), Kugel/Gips House, Wellfleet, MA 2010
Nevada Museum of Art, Center for Art + Environment, Reno, NV 6/2009. Research residency with The Altered Landscape Collection
The Porches Inn at MASS MoCA, North Adams, MA, 2007, 2008
Sundance Preserve, Sundance Resort, UT 2007
C-Scape Dune Shack, Provincetown, MA, 2006
Swing Space WorkSpace, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, New York, 2006
PUBLICATIONS + PRESS:
“Tea a Geo/Cosmo Event”, in collaboration with Valerie Triggs, Special Issue: OBJECTS, Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, Routledge, 2024
“Playing the Long Game, smudge studio offers a Broader Prospective,” Republican Journal, July 2022
'Is Not the Anthropocene a Thundering into Who Knows What?' in ASAP/J: Forum: Climate Change, Apocalypse, and the Arts of the Present, eds. Dan Sinykin and Jessica Hurley, Association for the Study of Arts of the Present, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2018
"Steps (ippo ippo ippo)", Lexicon for an Anthropocene Yet Unseen, eds. Cymene Howe, Anand Pandian, Journal for Cultural Anthropology, August 2016.
Interview, Artists in Conversation, BOMB magazine, online, May 2014
"Look Only At the Movement," Places: Design Observer, September 2013
"Siting A Geologic Turn at the 2011 Art + Environment Conference," (Part 1 and Part 2), PopTech, October 2011
“Food for Thinkers, Eating Rocks,” GOOD Magazine in collaboration with Friends of the Pleistocene, January 2011
PopTech Interview, An Obsession with the Past Projects Friends of the Pleistocene into the Future, February 2011
"Geologic City", Urban Omnibus, December 2010
Live blog from the Albuquerque Museum, LAND/ART Panel, June 2009
Why We Travel, New York Times, September 2009
Live blog from the Nevada Museum of Art, Art + Environment Conference, October 2008
Live blog from the Whitney Museum’s Buckminster Fuller Symposium, September 2008
"Becoming Human / Artist: Moving in Accord with the Change that Makes the World”
Performance Paradigm #4, 2008
“Limit Cases” Polar Inertia Journal, Issue #29, August 2007