The Moab Arts Reuse Residency (MARR), an annual program produced by Moab Arts in partnership with Canyonlands Solid Waste Authority and WabiSabi, announces artists Tom Hansell and Renée Reizman as the August 2023 artists in residence.

Since 2021, MARR has welcomed artists that thoughtfully consider their studio practice through the lens of sustainability and reuse. The four-week-long program grants artists access to materials at local waste disposal and recycling sites, in addition to housing, studio space, and a stipend. In exchange, artists provide opportunities for learning, dialogue and enrichment within the community, including artist talks, free workshops, and more. Thus far, MARR has hosted four artists from diverse backgrounds including architects, puppeteers, educators, and curators. Hansell and Reizman were selected from a pool of over 100 applicants from around the world for their visionary and well-suited proposals that center community participation.

Tom Hansell makes films and sculpture that explore relationships between energy, community, and nature. His artistic practice is deeply collaborative and highlights hidden connections between local ecosystems and the human cultures who inhabit these places. Repurposed materials and collaborative image making are increasingly important elements of his work as he experiments with ways to transform waste into visions that inspire others. Recently, he collaborated with rural communities to create a multimedia project that explores human interactions with freshwater ecosystems from the Blue Ridge Mountains to the Ohio River. He hopes that his projects can help build bridges that bring people together to celebrate common bonds, discuss differences, and shape sustainable cultures and communities.

Building on past work with tourism-focused communities in the Blue Ridge Mountains, Tom’s plans for the residency include public workshops where he’ll work alongside residents to create a set of video installations and a short film to be projected onto a large screen constructed from recycled and upcycled materials. Participants will contribute images and clips that Tom will edit into a video, along with interviews with residents about their perception of how waste culture manifests in Moab. The final film will be shown at Moab Arts on Tom’s upcycled screen on

Wednesday, August 30th. Plan to join Hansell for any (or all) of his free two-hour workshops at Moab Arts as part of his process:
Wednesday, August 9th from 6-8 pm: Introducing the Artist and Project
Wednesday, August 16th from 6-8pm: Symbols of Place
Wednesday, August 23rd from 6-8pm: Revising and Refining Our Films

Renée Reizman describes herself as a “relational artist,” working withcommunities to co-author dialogues about public policy, infrastructure, and intersectionality. Through interviews, storytelling, archival research, participatory workshops, and field work, she studies how people empower objects — via law, monetary value, craftsmanship, sentimental value, displaced anger — and collaboratively creates public programs, artworks, and exhibitions to amplify their voices. She’s worked with both urban and rural localities and institutions, including the Los Angeles Department of Transportation, quilters across rural Nebraska, and university students in Northwestern Oklahoma.

While in Moab for the Moab Arts Reuse Residency, Renée will be working directly with Canyonlands Solid Waste Authority employees to create a playful, crime procedural-inspired photo series and accompanying audio documentary that tells the most surprising stories involving Moab’s waste management. Across the country, waste management teams collaborate with law enforcement to report suspicious activities and locate forensic evidence. With this in mind, she plans to interview and photograph CSWA employees to learn about their most memorable crime-related work stories. She hopes that the project will allow the community to connect more with the services waste management provides and be a platform for people who live and work in the region to tell their stories in their own words. The resulting body of work will be installed at the Moab Arts facility for the month of September.

Reizman will also be teaching a free workshop, Making Postcards with Digital Collage, on Tuesday August 22nd from 6-8 pm at Moab Arts.

“Artist residencies are valuable because they spark the significant exchange of ideas and outside the box thinking for host communities,” says Melisa Morgan, Residency Coordinator. “Reuse is an important practice in Moab. Materials travel far to reach us here in the remote desert, and accumulate in excess due to the tourism industry — how can we be more creative with what’s available to us in the waste stream, and more mindful about what we use?”

To learn more about the residency program, including information about the projects of past residents, visit www.moabarts.org/residency. Follow Moab Arts on social media (@moabarts on Instagram and @Moab Arts - The MARC on Facebook) and sign up for our newsletter at www.moabarts.org for updates. Questions about MARR or the artists? Reach out to Residency Coordinator Melisa Morgan at mmorgan@moabcity.org or via phone at (435) 259-6272.
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