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In an especially happy ending, Garcia Peacock will come home with a gold: The European Cultural Centre’s (ECC) top award for Universities and Research-based Projects.

“It’s been such an honor to represent �������� on the global stage,” Garcia Peacock said. “And it was so special to include students in the work that led us here.”

Venice is a city awash in art. Venice Biennale, which ran from April through November, supersizes that. Art exhibits fill virtually every nook of the city and attract locals and visitors from around the world. Different countries showcase their art through the festival’s official national pavilions.

Pandemic Creation

Some of Garcia Peacock’s inspiration came from the COVID-19 pandemic, when many classes met online. She worked with the college to build an outdoor classroom for students to gather safely in person.

A Library, a Classroom, and the World had both indoor and outdoor locations. She co-curated its many components with Subhankar Banerjee, a University of New Mexico professor.

Their team crafted a library in the historic Palazzo Bembo along the Grand Canal near the Rialto bridge. Displays included drawings, digital illustrations, photographs, poetry and extensive narrative and scholarly text. Artists spent time talking with visitors about their work.

The team installed the outdoor classroom in the Marinaressa Gardens along the Venice Lagoon. With welcoming benches, lush plants, and a waterfront view, it became a popular destination for residents and visitors.

Last spring, students in Garcia Peacock’s environmental justice art class conducted research and capstone projects about some of the featured artists. In May, they went to the Venice Biennale.

“It was such an amazing experience,” said Marquia Humphries ’22, an art major who flew to Venice the day after she graduated. “This was my first time traveling internationally, and the exhibit was so good.”

She loved starting her days with the others in the outdoor classroom.

“Residents of Venice were really utilizing that space,” Humphries said. “People of all ages came. Kids played, older people admired the roses, couples strolled through. So many people have benefitted from the classroom’s creation—including myself.”

Featured artists came from diverse and often underrepresented backgrounds. Garcia Peacock says their work prompted visitors to talk about loss: From the pandemic, violence, racism and climate change—and how to steer the world away from its most destructive tendencies.

“It was great to have these spaces filled with people who were so engaged in these conversations,” she said. “It was really humbling and inspires you to hope, and to keep pushing toward these imagined futures.”

The UNM Center for Environmental Arts and Humanities, which Banerjee founded and directs, and the Environmental Studies Department at �������� College provided funding, support and co-produced the project for Personal Structures.

The �������� students spent a week exploring Personal Structures and other Venice Biennale exhibits. They put reports together and shared what they learned with other visitors. Annie Merrill, the Thomson Professor of Environmental Studies, also traveled with them.