Dana Russell creates his artwork by welding together found pieces of discarded materials, mostly metals, in a creative way. He asks the viewer to think about how his pieces make them feel. "When you do that you will be relating more closely to my feelings when I produced it. Truly “what you see is what you get.” And although I do not make art to impress others, I do make art to share my feelings."  - Dana Russell

Sayaka Ganz grew up with Shinto animist belief that all things in the world have spirits. Thus, discarded items on the street or thrift store shelves create a feeling of deep sadness for them and the artist is moved to make these abandoned objects happy.

The pieces in this exhibit use mostly plastic household items to create animal forms with a sense of movement and self-awareness. “One of the important tasks for artists of our time is to bring more of the natural world back into people's lives…. When we encounter the true wonders of nature, the beauty we behold transcends our intellects and reaches directly to our hearts. I desire a similar response from viewers of my work; to provoke a reexamination of our relationship to the natural world.” Sayaka Ganz

In the Legacy Gallery, the exhibit Pristine Land, 30 exquisite photographs by Milton Goldstein from the Museum’s Permanent Collection, is dedicated to the hope that all of us will work avidly and seriously to reduce the amount of trash generated which has reached unbelievable levels. 

In the future, when visitors look at these photographs of pristine lands, it would be a terrible tragedy if they saw these works as a time capsule of when the land was cared for and loved but that were living in a time when that was no longer true. Imagine a future when people had given up on pristine land because it was too difficult, too costly, too time consuming.

 If we do not care, who will?