Ashwini Bhat and Forrest Gander

In Ritual Encounters the Vanderhoef Studio Theatre is reconfigured as a kind of temple that celebrates the secular, sacred environment of Mount Tamalpais. Visitors to this installation are invited to circle in a ritual walk ceramic monuments and biomorphic sculptures that are ringed by dirt mandalas that are themselves edged with hems (hymns) of words. Through immersion in video, sculpture, poetry, and the clockwise movement of their own bodies through the exhibition, viewers can experience (or recall) their own link to the non-human world, and to reevaluate the ground they stand upon, both physically and ethically.

Ritual Encounters is the work of artists Ashwani Bhat and Forrest Gander. Bhat’s background is in literature and classical Indian dance, but she now works at the intersection of sculpture, ceramics, installation and performance. Gander is a writer and translator of poets from Spain, Latin America and Japan. His recent work includes the Pulitzer Prize-winning Be With.

Visitors can experience Ritual Encounters from Friday, April 15 to May 6. The experience will be open from 8am-3pm on Mondays through Fridays and Noon to 4pm on Saturdays.

On Friday, April 15 and Thursday, April 28 from 7:30pm-9:30pm, Ashwani Bhat and Forrest Gander will be on hand to speak and share poetry.