Hird, a painter, stage designer and award-winning filmmaker uses the mythical garden as a metaphor to explore how we perceive truth. Narratives favorites familiar from her childhood are re-imagined for our present day in large-scale paintings, interactive shadowbox gardens and animated videos. Seductively, charmingly, she challenges the viewer to choose whether or not to believe.

A mermaid plays the lyre with a boat on her head. An anthropomorphized cat considers her next move. A dragon smiles with its tongue out like a happy dog. Effio’s charming raku and concrete sculptures appear like characters from a children’s book, leaping into three dimensions.

Appleby’s wall-sized cyanotype prints are juxtaposed with plants, oolite and found objects in an immersive installation meant to have you gaze again at the world around you, with praise, consideration and collaborative energy.

Miami artist Meme Ferré’s abstract works unite a vibrant natural color palette reminiscent of her Caribbean heritage and the tropical, lush flora and fauna from her garden in Puerto Rico. Ferré believes her artistic gifts should be shared, inspiring her latest body of work, an homage of portraits that capture the essence of her friends and loved one’s personalities.

We close out the season with a celebration of the fruit that brings us joy – like holding sunshine in the palm of your hand – and an annual reminder of why we love our island home. In the same spirit, our summer group exhibition is a celebration of the creativity all around us, as our family of artist members share the fruits of their labors (mango-inspired or otherwise), with something for every taste.