Crista Cammaroto is a prolific interdisciplinary artist whose work focuses on place-making and reconnecting humans with the earth, our primary home. In her installation, Overlook, Cammaroto deals directly with the loss of species that have been overlooked on earth. As we reckon with the loss of our own species, felt so heavily today, Cammaroto touches a nerve: these losses in both the natural world and the human world are all due to our own action, or inaction.

Her Terra Forma print series stems from her three-dimensional earth works. Cammaroto uses natural materials – such as leaves and dirt – to create temporary, site-specific works of art. She then photographs the earth work. As Cammaroto describes the resulting image: “the heightened moment of completion is photographed and becomes an archival print, an artifact of the temporal moment. Making in places where others circulate ‘outside’ is a significant performative aspect to my work. I often place forms in high circulation areas and leave collected found materials where people feel comfortable adding to each Terra Form. I invite specific planned groups and pedestrians to work with me or refresh the work new foliage in the following days. The experience is to be shared, changed and felt by others, with the hopes of inspiring a deeper engagement to the sophistication and balance of the natural world.”   Cammaroto is also a curator and art professor. She has completed residencies at Little Italy Arts Center, The McColl Center for Visual Art, and an assistantship at Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Colorado. Cammaroto’s work is in the permanent collection of the Denver Art Museum, the Bechtler Contemporary Collection, and special collections of UNCC.

David J. Butler is a photographer and videographer who has been involved in several landmark arts efforts in Charlotte. Butler curated Welcome To Brookhill at The Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture, coordinated video production for the first series of the #HomeCLT program at the Levine Museum of the New South, and is a founding member of Hue House, a creative agency focused on building bridges between creatives of color and Charlotte’s cultural and government institutions. Butler also currently serves as program director for beSOCIAL and operates Analogue Luxury, a series of branded art projects based in vintage photography and design. In 2018 he was named Charlottean of the Year for his work in the arts sector.

J. Stacy Utley is a critically acclaimed artist whose work addresses complex narratives found within the African American diaspora. Utley is limitless in his experimentation with medium, shaping his body of work in ink, watercolor, oil and chalk pastels, acrylics, and found or sourced objects. His collages, assemblages, paintings and drawings address the topics of displacement, cultural appropriation, religion, race, mental illness and sexuality. Conversant topics of the African American community that shape identities and are not always comfortable to discuss.

Utley is a graduate of North Carolina State University, College of Design where he received a Bachelor’s degree in Architecture. His career as an architect/designer has both influenced and provided a rich source for his work. He went on to receive a Masters of Fine Art from Lesley University College of Art and Design in Cambridge Massachusetts. Utley has shown nationally, exhibiting in solo exhibits and numerous group exhibitions. His executed works can be found in private, public and university collections including North Carolina State University and Johnson C Smith University. He is a public artist and have received commissions from the Arts and Science Council of Charlotte NC, and the Durham Public Arts Commission.