Ann Savageau
Bags Across the Globe installation, including a ‘tornado’ of 1,000 plastic bags at UC Davis Design Museum. A global collaborative project on the environmental damage cause by plastic shopping bags
Bags Across the Globe installation at SOFA Chicago with giant plastic bag made from over 1,000 plastic bagsInstallation view of Instinct/Extinct: the Great Pacific Flyway, a collaborative traveling exhibition depicting the beauty of and threats to California’s Pacific Flyway
Installation view of Instinct/Extinct: the Great Pacific Flyway, a collaborative traveling exhibition depicting the beauty of and threats to California’s Pacific Flyway
Central Valley Ghost Stories, an elegy on the extinct and threatened species of animals and plants in California. Shown in the traveling invitational exhibition Ignite! The Art of Sustainability
The Scream; a contemporary interpretation of the iconic painting through the lens of climate change
Untitled triptych made from hornet next paper. One of series of my collaborations with other species
Totems: paint enhanced beetle-etched poles; one of series of my collaborations with other species
Maquette of installation of Guardians, a commentary on loss and resilience during the time of pandemic and climate change
One of the 17 life size figures from Guardians
At the Crossroads: an installation on climate change and species extinction shown at the Washtenaw Community College Art Gallery
Ann Savageau is an artist, activist, poet and educator living in Davis, California.
Ann taught at the University of Michigan, and at University of California, Davis, where she is Professor Emerita of Design. During her time at UC Davis she created two new courses on the principles and practices of sustainability applied to the design field. She also helped found the Aggie Reuse Store, a student-run unit that promotes the creative reuse of campus post-consumer waste.
Ann lectures and exhibits nationally and internally. She has taught sustainability workshops in the United States, Spain, Japan and Colombia. Ann’s work has been shown locally, regionally, nationally and internationally. Her work has been featured in nearly 100 exhibitions and 70 publications, including numerous reviews and catalogs, American Craft, and in the book Secret Spaces of Childhood. Ann has curated and juried numerous exhibitions. She has authored academic papers on waste and sustainability and on strategies to make sustainability tangible to students.
For over forty years Ann’s work has explored the natural world, human culture, and their intersection. In her work Ann investigates global warming and environmental destruction, as well as consumer culture and wasteful consumption. Her work reflects her efforts to bring out the hidden beauty of waste through artistic transformation, and to promote environmental stewardship through the creative reuse of post-consumer materials. Ann’s Stanford anthropological training, her lifelong interest in the natural world, and the cultures she has lived in (including Colorado, Iran, Australia and Europe) are reflected in her art.
Ann works individually or with fellow artists and scholars from other disciplines as well as environmental activists from around the world to address pressing environmental issues. Her largest project, Bags Across the Globe, involved collaboration with over 200 people in 63 countries. Most recently she has addressed the multiple crises facing our planet in her installation titled Guardians.
A selection of her work can be seen at annsavageau.com.