Amy Helfand

Amy Helfand has a BA in American Studies and Photography from Hampshire College and an MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She was the Executive Director of The West Kortright Centre from 2018-2020 and is currently living and working in Red Hook, Brooklyn, and maintaining her connection to Delaware County by working for The 607 CSA. 

Artist statement
I have always been interested in the ways in which nature seems eccentric and strange, and am fascinated by our culture’s attempts to comprehend its peculiarities in order to find our place within it. In my practice, I collect images of plant life, ephemera from the landscape, and maps of gardens, transforming their biomorphic contours into idiosyncratic, abstracted objects and sites of my own imagining, trying to find MY place. I make and arrange objects, and in the case of these photographs, locate them in the actual landscape.

All of this in an effort to better understand the tension between order and chaos, between representation and abstraction, between nature and culture. In the landscapes I encounter, I try to make a place for myself, whether that is through photography, drawing, collage, installation, textiles, or ceramics. 

Artist website (rugs)
Instagram