“Since childhood, I have intermittently found myself marveling at the variety of insects and their unique behaviors and habits. After relocating to rural Kentucky from urban Minneapolis in fall 2012, I found myself looking and listening for the landscape’s narrative. Living away from the city has inspired a reconnection with the insect world and the natural rhythms of nature and time.” —Joanne Price
Just in time for BugFest, a new exhibit entitled ‘Beneficial Insects, An Artist Book in Progress’ will be on display at Bernheim’s Visitor Center. Beneficial insects are insects that pollinate trees and plant-life while they collect nectar from flowers. Insects that are predators of undesirable, destructive insects are also seen as beneficial to human activities. Examples of beneficial insects that are helpful to your garden, yard and house are dragonflies, parasitic wasps, pollinators like bees, butterflies and moths, assassin bugs, assassin flies, lady beetle larvae, spiders, and house centipedes. The concept of beneficial is subjective depending upon the desired outcomes from a human perspective. Joanne Price brings the subject of beneficial insects to life, depicting these creatures in a scientific yet surreal fashion, through the labor-intensive printmaking process of relief engraving.
Beneficial Insects began as a book project in 2014 when Price was given access to Bernheim’s extensive insect collection through the Regional Artist Program (formally known as Local Use by Local Artists). The Regional Artist Program was established to encourage artists, educators and students within the surrounding region to use Bernheim’s resources and facilities to create nature based works of art that help fulfill the mission of ‘connecting people with nature’. After time spent drawing and photographing Bernheim’s insect collection, progress on the illustrations continued during an Artist-In-Residence at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts and end results were ultimately realized through an Artist Enrichment Grant from the Kentucky Foundation for Women in 2017.
Bernheim is excited to see the project come full circle and honored to display Beneficial Insects in during BugFest 2017 on Saturday September 16th from 9am – 4pm at the Visitor Center! Joanne Price will be on site that day conducting an Apis (Honey Bee) activity and a Viceroy butterfly book project for kids of all ages. Beneficial Insects will be on display through October 31st, 2017. Framed prints are available for sale and can be purchased at the Visitor Center kiosk. To see more work by Joanne Price, check out her website at www.starpointestudio.com.
Joanne Price is an academically trained printmaker currently living in Bagdad, Kentucky. In addition to a BFA from Buffalo State College and an MFA from the University of Minnesota, Price has over 25 years of professional printmaking experience and over 10 years of exhibition management. Price is the founder and owner of Starpointe Studio which specializes in printmaking and book arts providing custom illustrations, art prints, book binding design and letterpress printing. Joanne is the current President of the Wood Engravers’ Network as well as an elected member of the Society of Wood Engravers.
Her work is included in numerous public and private collections; most notably at the Guangdong Museum of Art in China; Hamilton Wood Type & Printing Museum in Wisconsin, Yale University, University of Colorado, University of Denver, University of Kentucky and Vanderbilt University.