GOLDENROD

Sunday, August 14th: 3-6pm
GOLDENROD
a public intervention and pop-up tea shop by Brigitta Varadi

What is touching and tasting?  What does it mean to yield to a tactual provocation as the recipients of art? Does activation of the senses, other than vision, launch some other mechanism for the understanding of works of art? Through the reassessment of a daily activity, GOLDENROD examines how memory can inform our present day perspective.
During a two month residency at The Wassaic Project in the fall of 2015 (Wassaic, NY), Brigitta Varadi collected and dried local goldenrods following her grandmother’s knowledge. She created 1000 Goldenrod Tea bags, each numbered and signed, accompanied by 100 screen printed tea boxes. The work echoed Varadi’s grandmother’s own practice: a process-oriented labor and old tradition passed down from each generation.  The tea becomes a symbol for both the artist and the audience to question and examine multiple levels of depth regarding memories of the past.  In addition to the tea, Varadi created objects using textured wool dyed with goldenrod – hand felted and hand stitched – to provide a platform for an intimate engagement of conversing and tea drinking.