Flagler College welcomes Osaka, Japan-based artist Mai Ueda as the Crisp-Ellert Art Museum’s (CEAM) artist-in-residence from Monday, Nov. 17, through Wednesday, Nov. 26. A performance and tea ceremony will be held on Tuesday, Nov. 18, at 6:30 p.m. at Ringhaver Student Center’s Virginia Room, 50 Sevilla St. in downtown St. Augustine. This event is free and open to the public.
Ueda’s work crosses platforms such as performance, drawing, poetry and installation.
Since 2012, the artist has focused on “non-material” mediums, celebrating her Japanese roots and heritage by centering her practice around the tradition of the Japanese tea ceremony. According to Ueda, a tea ceremony brings people together to share knowledge and emotions, creating an environment of awareness and presentness.
In 2014, Ueda co-founded World Tea Gathering, a community for artists exploring tea as an art form. She has exhibited her work and performed in museums and institutions around the world, including with Rirkrit Tiravanija at the National Gallery Singapore (2018) and Saint Croix Museum Poitier (2019), MONA Tasmania (2013), MACRO Rome (2012), Performa New York (2009), Venice Biennale (2009) and Seoul Biennial (2004).
During her residency, Ueda will participate in campus activities, working with students, staff and faculty through class visits and student critiques, as well as her public performance.
The artist will also engage with the community and collaborate with local artists through special programming, such as ceramics workshops. Ueda will spend the rest of her time simply exploring the area to find inspiration for future work.
The CEAM Artist Residency, in collaboration with Flagler College’s Department of Visual Arts, is a regular program of artists-in-residence to engage in themes of place-making while collaborating with some aspect of St. Augustine’s local community, the city’s significant and varied roles in American history, or its rich natural environment.
A goal of the residency is to foster diverse perspectives on these aspects of the local community, and artists and scholars in a range of fields are invited to integrate and collaborate between the areas of fine art and broader fields of inquiry, such as curatorial practice, performing arts and creative writing.
