BEA WOLERT STUDIO.

A once-thriving tree, now hollowed by age or illness, stands as a quiet monument to resilience and impermanence. Its large cavity—both wound and window—became the site of an ephemeral gesture: a one-day installation inviting community members to participate in a collective act of reverence.

By retrofitting the hollow with a base of styrofoam—an artificial material that contrasts starkly with the tree’s natural decay—I created a temporary vessel for renewal. Participants were invited to insert brightly colored silk flowers. These tender offerings speak to our desire to honor what is fading—to beautify what may be seen as broken, and to connect with a living organism that continues to exist, however compromised it may seem.The installation blurs the line between memorial and celebration—altereing its state with intentional beauty. The act of communal flower placement transforms the tree into a living altar—part sculpture, part ritual—animating it for a single day in a moment of shared presence.

“Heart of Greenpoint” is an action, a convening, a happening centered around process, play and mindfulness. It is an act of celebration, play, a passage and marking of time, a tribute to McGolrick Park which served as an anchor and respite for the community during the pandemic. The rules of engagement are simple. Using traditional sidewalk chalk, participants are invited to color the pavilion hexagons with bright colors to contrast with the surrounding greenery. The aim is to fill up as much of the hexagons as possible with different colors. The project is akin to a large-scale quilting bee. Hexagons provide great geometric design possibilities. In numerous cultutures, hexagons are symbolic of universal coherance, harmony, balance. They are found in beehives and are the most structurally stable shape for load distribution. They are utilized in cell phone towers to maximize surface area with no overlapping shapes. These concepts of stability and balance resonate with the project. Individual actions combine showcasing each participant’s contribution to the collective effort. It is my hope that the community’s gestures radiate outward and a memory of the experience remains, even whilst the colors wash and fade.

During the pandemic, I began working more outdoors with the natural elements, most notably in neighborhood parks in where I live in. Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Tropical storm Isaias felled alot of trees. I sought out ways to bring ideas of healing to the greater community, from the metaphorical and symbolic healing of fallen and impaled trees to written messages of hope and healing written in text formed from large scale fallen and painted branches. The trees hold mysteries of years of unspoken knowledge and I aim to reveal some of those truths. The 30’ x 8’ site was a site of daily ritual where I used natural materials including sumi ink and turmeric to paint sections of the trees. The natural elements of rain and the UV rays of the sun would wash away and lighten the natural colors I had applied. It became a place I visited regularly to apply more washes and to engage with passerbys.

PIEROGI PROJECT is an ongoing participatory project aiming to capture stories of a food of unknown exact origin. I work with individuals and groups inviting participants to make pierogi in clay, which then are systematically documented and archived. I also collect photographs, videos, audio stories, recipes and ephemera related to the traditions of pierogi making. Each contribution is numbered and logged into the archive.

During the time of seeking personal inner space in 2016, I became interested in working with reflective materials as a metaphor for introspection and reflection. In my pursuit of investigating reflectivity, I attained a 100-foot roll of silver reflective mylar used for thermal insulation. Initially, I rolled it out onto the Vermont landscape and captured the reflection of sunset. The reflections captured the fluidity of the material, feeling like moving water. The next morning, I enlisted the support of an aerial photographer and another artist and captured flares from the sun. We all succumbed to the inherent properties of this resilient and reflective material.

A touchstone is a reference point from which other things can be evaluated—reference of place, connection to a specific emotion, memory of a particular event. Oftentimes, the TouchStones reference imaginary landscapes or worlds that are meant to be discovered. In addition to visual elements, some TouchStones incorporate the olfactory sense with use of essential oils. This amplifies the sensory experience and potential for strengthening the formation of memories. Marcel Proust stated that "the smell and taste of things remain poised a long time, ready to remind us... the immense edifice of memory". I am interested how an object, scent, texture, temperature can tie into a memory of a specific place, person or experience; how a small moment evokes the infinite; how the miniature becomes monument. TouchStones are intended to be picked up by the viewer so they can experience the different textures, weights, temperatures, some even create a sound as handled.

As a young child, I sat on the floor mesmerized by the beautiful pieces of cabbage falling into a tea towel onto her lap. She sang songs from the country in her town of Konopki Chude. I was deeply worried that she may cut herself and quite relieved when the whole process was over. I tried recreating the memory in a two-part video piece entitled: “Attempt at a Memory: Grandma Cuts Cabbage”. This process gave me permission to slice an industrial spool of thread, the same color as the cabbage to its core, from which the Sliced Thread series was born. The cutting is not a function of necessity, but rather it was used as a way to reveal inherent character and vulnerability of the thread. I am hoping that the common object gains more meaning and value through this simple, yet powerful act.

“Offering” is a time-based kinetic wall and floor piece comprised of cake decorating piping bags filled with acrylic paint thinned with flow medium enhancing the paint’s fluidity. During a performative piece, the piping bags are pierced activating the paint to be released to drip down the wall and pool onto the floor covering. Former projects and processes inform new works in my practice. What once was considered residue, waste or byproduct in former works now becomes the focal point. Cake decorating piping bags once served as tools to make decorative paintings now become the object of focus. The offering series explores the spirituality of materials. The work looks at the fluidity and ephemerality of paint. As the paint drips from the wall to the floor, the viewer is asked to consider both the physical properties of paint in different states as well as the complexities of the giving and receiving aspects of an offering.

The handmade and hand painted tiles for this site specific piece entitled, “In Memory of a Summer Garden in Bloom” were made for the occasion of Bartow-Pell’s Centennial Exhibition. I took into consideration the surroundings of the garden. Studying the colors of the plants and flowers in bloom during the peak of the summer, I color matched the paint to echo those colors. These specific colors invite the viewers to reflect on their surroundings, both of recent time passed as well as the current moment. I invited participants to explore the gardens to see if they can locate the source colors and identify new ones. As the seasons changed and flowers and plants died, the installations’ focus changed to serve as a reminder of the summer that passed.

Working in ceramics and hand throwing allows me to explore the physicality of the natural material itself worked by my hand and body. The form of the clay is defined by gravity and my force of throwing. The process is a physical performance, a dance of throwing and stretching and understanding my physical properties and limitations, as well as that of the clay. I pull the clay towards myself—first on the y-axis and then on the x-axis. The clay gives in, stretches, and pulls back. The pieces reveal the form and edges as defined by my hand and the action of throwing and exemplify the sought after space. Gravity further plays a role when the piece is drying.

The process and approach to the material and the meaning shifts as a result of the interaction of the material and the hand as well as the intentionality of the act behind it. It is the interaction and connectedness to the materials, the respect for materials, and the tactility between the hand and the matter that expose relationships between human and material worlds.