Steve Rossi: Prior Appropriation

The Mueller Gallery at Caldwell University is excited to present “Prior Appropriation”, a solo exhibition featuring interdisciplinary artist Steve Rossi, with a special immersive sound component by artist Robbie Wing (Cherokee Nation).

Referencing the modernist grid and the visual language of geometric abstraction, Rossi explores issues surrounding natural resource sustainability, the industrial nature of food production, and the financialization of land ownership. His creative approach was initially inspired by a flight to eastern New Mexico, during which he observed the Southern High Plains landscape from above and was fascinated by the patterns of color, line and shape that it displayed created through the extensive use of groundwater pivot irrigation. This sparked his interest in, and investigation of, the industrial and economic aspects of agricultural processes that connect all people. Incorporating an artistic practice that combines sculpture, painting, and video projection, Rossi says that he aims to make visible systems of social and economic organization. He wants to encourage dialogue among viewers regarding the harmful effects of current groundwater management policies that support industrial agriculture in the Southern High Plains—a region responsible for much beef and cotton production—as well as question the management of limited natural resources and its impact on current and future generations. The exhibition title “Prior Appropriation” highlights a system often used to allocate fresh water resources in the western states, where the early user has a legal right to ground or surface water to the exclusion of the rights of those who come later.¹

In addition to the painting and relief sculptures on view, there will be an immersive sound and video projection installation. Robbie Wing has contributed a sound-based artwork, recorded by placing a microphone underwater to create an atmospheric sonic experience that will accompany a video projection.

The area of the Great Plains region referenced in Rossi’s work has been the traditional homeland of the Kiowa, Mescalero Apache, Comanche and Lipan Apache people. Native people have stewarded the land on the North American continent for thousands of years prior to European colonization, sustaining relationships with water sources so different from the nonrenewable and extractive practices currently in use throughout the Southern High Plains today. Benjamin Fernandez ’24, a senior and studio art major, and assistant to Caldwell University Mueller Gallery director Suzanne Kammin Baron, says, “In Steve Rossi’s exhibition, the natural topography of the landscape amalgamates with systematic processes of industry. He maps out a series of multidirectional, multidimensional journeys that extend beyond boundaries, inviting viewers to embark on an expedition of discovery. Rossi hopes to empower viewers to become part of larger solutions by initiating awareness and constructive change.”

Steve Rossi, born into a family of makers, developed an intense appreciation of and respect for craft and physical labor as he grew up around family members making quilts, knitting blankets, fixing cars, building houses and arranging flowers. He received his B.F.A. from Pratt Institute in 2000, and his M.F.A. from the State University of New York at New Paltz in 2006. His work has been exhibited at Dorsky Gallery Curatorial Programs, ecoartspace, NURTUREart, the Open Engagement conference at the Queens Museum, BronxArtSpace, the Wassaic Project, the John Michael Kohler Arts Center, the Jules Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art, and the public art festival Art in Odd Places, among many other venues. He has participated in artist residencies at the Vermont Studio Center and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s Arts Center Residency on Governors Island. In 2022, he was awarded the Sustainable Arts Foundation fellowship at Gallery Aferro in Newark, New Jersey. As a part-time faculty member, he has taught in the First Year Program at Parsons School of Design, the Sculpture Program and Art Education Program at the State University of New York at New Paltz, and the Art Department at Westchester Community College. He is currently an assistant professor and the sculpture program head at Saint Joseph’s University. Rossi splits his time between Beacon, New York and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Robbie Wing (Cherokee Nation) is an artist, musician and composer. His artistic practice focuses on immersive and spatialized sound installations, ecological sound art and compositions for acoustic instruments, electronics and field recordings. Wing holds an undergraduate degree in Environmental Sustainability and a master’s degree in Urban Design from the University of Oklahoma, where he developed sound art installations inspired by his research on environmental psychology and acoustic landscapes. Wing has presented his work and performed at various venues, including the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art, Flagship at Tulsa Artist Fellowship, the Philbrook Museum of Art, the University of Kent in Chatham, UK, the Institute of Advanced Studies in Kószeg, Hungary, Roy and Edna Disney CalArts Theater and the Center for Art, Research and Alliances.