Friends and Family on the Frontier

Friends and Family on the Frontier by Cyrus Smith (2016)

In 2009, I graduated from a program at Portland State University called “Art and Social Practice.” Founded by artist Harrell Fletcher, the program was designed to support artists who work in the world rather than in their studios. The cornerstone of the program was a lecture series where every week a new artist came to visit, gave a lecture, and joined us for an intimate dinner. I'll admit that many of these artists were heroes of mine, whose work I had celebrated, and whose lives I had romanticized. Over the course of my two year education, however, I came to know that these artists were in fact real people, with real lives. Furthermore, it turned out that many of these artists knew each other, were a part of each other's lives. In some cases, they had gone to school together, knew each other’s children and pets, and were as much family as they were friends. This is when it dawned on me that the “art world” is in fact the “real world.”

This may seem simple, but at the time it was a revelation. It was in that moment that I decided that I could no longer learn from a book, or from a mentor. Instead, I chose to travel in order to seek out the places where I might find my own community—where I might meet the artists who would become a part of my family. When I set sail on this adventure, I had no way of knowing that the road would bring me time and time again to a small town in rural Utah, a place called Green River.

My first trip to Green River was in the summer of 2013 to participate in a residency organized by Cabin-Time. That week in the blazing sunshine and occasional downpours, a group of us created a temporary community. We stayed off the grid, away from our email inboxes and digital devices and instead became each other’s entertainment. As if by design, by the end of the week we had become friends. There is, of course, no way to force a friendship, but I will say that Cabin-Time did set the stage for us to find friendship through long hours of stargazing, canyon hikes, and crackling fires. And so, as I had hoped, I had discovered a part of my artist family.

Little did I know just how large of a family I had joined.

It turns out that we were not simply being hosted by Cabin Time, but that Cabin Time was in fact being hosted by Epicenter, which brings artists from all over the world to make work in the community of Green River. I knew even before I left that I would apply for the Frontier Fellowship. As luck would have it, I was able to return just six months later in January of 2014.

It was during my Fellowship that I started to see how interconnected the Epicenter community had become. When I arrived I was greeted by four former Fellows. Each one I had worked with before, and had already considered as friends. They were all in town for a retreat, planning for the future of Epicenter, including preparations for the “The Green River Magazine,” which became my primary focus during the fellowship. There is no way to express how strange and wonderful it was to have driven to the middle of the desert to a town with a population under 1,000, only to be reunited with friends and artist who I knew from as far away as Portland, Oregon, Queens, New York, and Greensboro, North Carolina.

In the Fall of 2015, I returned to Green River once again, this time to work with Epicenter in partnership with High Desert Test Sites on an event. HDTS: Epicenter was an opportunity for former Fellows to return and share their work in an intensive weekend-long festival format. My role in this process was to facilitate projects (securing sites, working on the catalog, coordinating volunteers, and communicating with each artist about their work). This put me at the center of an elaborate communication chain between Epicenter and its former Fellows. It was clear from the start that each one of the artists (like me) had a strong connection with Green River, and regarded Epicenter as a kind of home away from home. All were excited to see their favorite sights, meet with their favorite locals, and to overwhelm the Epicenter staff homes with dinner parties and late night bonfires.

Return they did, in full force. For the long weekend, Green River was teeming with artists, observers, and fellow travelers who had come to be a part of HDTS: Epicenter. While I could go on and on about how special each of the individual artworks were, what I will always remember are the people. HDTS: Epicenter was our Fellowship family reunion. A weekend of art? Yes. But also a weekend of long conversations, impromptu hikes, coffee corrals, family dinners, big hellos, and long goodbyes.

And so, as it turns out, the art world is the real world. Where there are connections between artist's work, there are likely also friendships. Where there are friendships there is likely a gathering place. I am thankful to Green River and the Frontier Fellowship for providing a crossroads where we all have been able to meet. Where we have been inspired by each other. Where we have become a part of each other's lives. Where we have become a part of each other's family.