Hugh Livingston was invited to be the first artist in residence at the Chalk Hill Artists' Residency, in support of his collaboration with Russian Riverkeeper and to build on the substantial financial support of the Creative Work Fund. This residency enabled the completion of the gallery show at SlaughterhouseSpace in Healdsburg and the permanent Sound & Sculpture Garden installation at the Sonoma County Museum in Santa Rosa, as well as the initial sketches of the Russian River Opera, which arrives on the Ranch's riverfront on August 10, 2013.
A celebration of sound and visual art was held at the Ranch in August 2011 to commemorate the first year of the Artist in Residence program. Hugh's contribution, River Triptych, is seen here: Ranchfest 2011 video. Birdcages are filled with imaginary birds, improvising on the classics, riffing through stolen melodies; cuckoos clock and clack and can't quite keep time; underwater bubbles come to the surface, making rhythmic patterns in a field of alien wildflowers; windows frame distant vistas, radiating with yesterday's sound, a granular frog, a repeating river, a Creek chorus of Euphrats, glass sounds floating by. Afterwards you will want to curl up with a good brook.