The Center Can Not Hold / Anne Mooney, John Sparano, and Hannah Vaughn / Curated by Hikmet Loe

The Center Can Not Hold considers ideas of place conceptualized through the processes of architecture, revealing the temporal nature of the center. Positioning the geographical center of Utah and the town of Ephraim as the practical center for creative work, regional architects Anne Mooney and John Sparano (principals at Sparano + Mooney Architecture) and Hannah Vaughn (principal at VY Architecture) respond to this idea through forms, words, and questions. Their collective and collaborative result is not architecture to be built, but contemporary art that acts as a catalyst to mine conceptual layers of engagement with the past, the present, and the future. The ephemerality of the present moment—who occupies place, what traces remain of their existence—leads to questions of past occupation, how place is mapped, and concepts of erasure, remembrance, and memory. The residue of stories from people who have come before us and who will follow us, in our own situation of place and center, is reflected through the materiality of maps (realized and imagined), the layers of time and earth, and casts of accumulation. These works ask: who has the privilege to see the center? How can we broaden our views to “see” the accumulation of time and embrace our connection to place through a center that is continually shifting? Is there, indeed, a center (geographic, historical) that holds us together? The absence of one center opens infinite views and possibilities.

ABOUT THE CURATOR
Born and raised on the east coast, Hikmet Sidney Loe developed an affinity for Great Basin deserts and the environs of Great Salt Lake. In response to these landscapes, her work advanced to examine the changeable nature of the earth and address our perceptual and cultural constructs of the land. Her curatorial projects mine ideas of place – This Earth: Notes and Observations by Montello Foundation Artists, Southern Utah Museum of Art; geologic material – A Measure of Salt, Granary Arts; and artists’ responses to their environments – upcoming Modern Desert Markings: An Homage to Las Vegas Area Land Art, Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art.
She authored The Spiral Jetty Encyclo: Exploring Robert Smithson’s Earthwork through Time and Place in 2017; it won the 15 Bytes Book Award for Art Book in 2018 and was a finalist for the Utah State Historical Society Best Book Award. The next book in this series focused on singular works of Land art is scheduled for publication in 2026 as The Sun Tunnels Encyclo: Exploring Nancy Holt’s Earthwork through Perception and Site. Loe additionally writes for Southwest Contemporary, Hyperallergic, and 15 Bytes. She is a seasoned educator, currently teaching art history as a part-time instructor at University of Nevada, Las Vegas, where she holds Graduate College status. Her passion for experiential teaching and learning has afforded her teaching opportunities for the Honors College, University of Utah in their Ecology & Legacy Integrated Minors Program and for the Honors College, Westminster College. She has also taught at Weber State University and for both Clemente and Venture Programs through Utah Humanities.
Visit her website at www.hikmetsidneyloe.com or follow her on Instagram @hikmet23

ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Anne G. Mooney, AIA, NCARB, LEED AP, was born in Butte, Montana and was educated at the University of Utah, Columbia University in New York, the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) in Los Angeles and Ticino, Switzerland. She is a founding partner of Sparano + Mooney Architecture and her award-winning designs have been featured in over 35 national and international publications and exhibitions in the United States, England, Italy, Germany, and Japan. She has served on the AIA Utah Board of Directors and was named one of the Top Women in Architecture by Mountain Living magazine. Anne is recognized as a committed educator and mentor for students, and emerging architects and design professionals. She holds an appointment as Professor of Architecture at the University of Utah School of Architecture where she teaches advanced design studios. In 2021 Anne was awarded the Silver Medal by the AIA Western Mountain Region, the top honor given to an architect in the region.
Visit her website at www.sparanomooney.com or follow her on Instagram @sparanomooneyarchitecture

John P. Sparano, FAIA, is a founding partner of Sparano + Mooney Architecture. John was educated at the Catholic University of America in Washington D.C. and the Architectural Association in London, England. Drawing insight from place, program and client vision, Sparano creates compelling spaces that connect people with their communities and landscape. He is adept at seamlessly integrating new buildings into a variety of high-altitude contexts with heightened cultural and historic significance. His analytical approach to design, coupled with expertise in new and innovative application and detailing of materials, has set him apart as a leading architect in the American West. Sparano was recognized with the 2019 Silver Medal from the AIA Western Mountain Region, the highest award given to an architect in this region of the United States. Under his leadership, Sparano + Mooney Architecture’s design process accentuates collaboration, research and experimentation, and has resulted in a diverse, award-winning portfolio of work. Sparano has lectured and exhibited widely.
Visit his website at www.sparanomooney.com or follow him on Instagram @sparanomooneyarchitecture

Hannah Vaughn, AIA, is an architect and educator based in Salt Lake City, Utah. In collaboration with Scott Yribar, she founded VY Architecture, with offices in Utah and Idaho. Hannah’s work is centered around the primacy of making, craft as an expression of the value of things, and the necessary resourcefulness of building. The connection to material, people, and place is expanded with a mission in practice to generate work that is both pragmatic and poetic – architecture that is responsible to the community and the future; spaces that silently frame meaningful human experience and have a positive impact beginning to end. Vaughn holds an M.Arch from the University of Utah and a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy from the University of New Mexico. She teaches design studio at the University of Utah School of Architecture as adjunct faculty, regularly serves on design juries, and is active in the creative and design communities of Utah and the Mountain West region.

As part of her practice, Vaughn frequently engages in peri-practical studies that explore the connection to place [the desert/mountain west], the intuitive and learned manipulation of materials, and the physics and techne of details. These studies culminate in the form of installations, organized discussions, remote performance installations, and various other permutations of inquiry. Notable works include a weighty sculptural installation at the Finch Gallery titled “9 Territories” that examines the domain of the Salt Lake Valley in its precise topography in juxtaposition to the momentary human impact; “Une Chambre pour les Vivants/A Room for the Living,” a remote performance and installation of placemaking and resistant act of domesticity [taking care] as a Frontier Fellow with Epicenter, Utah, in collaboration with Damien Delorme, located on The Slabs outside of Green River, Utah; and “Near Distance,” a permanent installation at the Salt Lake City Airport, in collaboration with Soonju Kwon and Reihaneh Noori – a multimedia work that gathers a proxy of our common horizon into a dense line/void that connects/divides textured and well-traveled surfaces. Through these studies, Vaughn connects to place, to community, and to the materials of making.
Visit her website at www.vyarch.com or follow her on Instagram @vyarchitecture

Event is free and open to the public.

Granary Arts is supported in part by Utah Division of Arts & Museums, with funding from the State of Utah and the National Endowment for the Arts, VIA Art Fund in partnership with Wagner Foundation, Sorenson Legacy Foundation, The Paul T. Walton Jr. Charitable Foundation, The Sam and Diane Stewart Family Foundation, Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation, The Ephraim City RAP Tax Fund, Mormon Pioneer National Heritage Area, Sites Set for Knowledge and Utah Humanities, Sanpete County Travel, and generous support from Ephraim City.