FELTON — Friday will mark the fourth anniversary of the CZU Lightning Complex fires, in which a series of lightning strikes during a dry summer sparked a set of wildfires in the Santa Cruz Mountains that burned more than 86,000 acres, destroyed 1,490 buildings and killed a 73-year-old Last Chance resident.
It is a pain that residents continue to experience, but a program at the Felton Branch Library aims to acknowledge the grief and loss the Santa Cruz Mountains community residents have faced while also celebrating renewal. Artist Felicia Rice and poet Theresa Whitehill will be bringing their Heavy Lifting Listening Tour — featuring poetry, art and an experimental short film — to the library Aug. 24.
Rice is an artist and publisher who utilized letterpress and digital technologies through her company Moving Parts Press, which began producing limited edition artists books, prints, and broadsides in collaboration with other artists starting in 1977. Her books are held in library and museum collections throughout the world, and she was featured in the PBS documentary series “Craft in America.”
Rice was personally impacted by the CZU fires, as she resided in Bonny Doon at the time, where her letterpress shop was destroyed. She has since relocated to Mendocino County, opened a new studio and reestablished Moving Parts Press.
Prior to the fires, Rice was working with Whitehill — a Ukiah poet who studied at UC Santa Cruz — on a book titled “Heavy Lifting,” in which a poem sparked a drawing which sparked a poem which sparked a book. In the early stages of the book’s publishing, Rice not only lost her letterpress in the fires, but the world was experiencing the COVID-19 pandemic, 2020 presidential election and killing of George Floyd — all within the same summer. This shaped a new direction for the book.
“Heavy Lifting took flight in spite of and because of our personal and collective crises of this terrible time and tackles these issues in book form, performance, and dialogue in search of a tenable future,” Rice and Whitehill wrote on the Moving Parts Press website.
“Heavy Lifting” features poems by Whitehill opposite prints by Rice, all presented in accordion-fold panels. In addition to the book, Whitehill and Rice also put together a short film titled “On Heavy Lifting” which features readings of Whitehill’s poems, footage of the bookmaking process and digital projections of words, birds, shadows and more to create an immersive viewing experience. It was screened at the Mendocino Film Festival as part of its Reel Mendo series earlier this year.
Rice and Whitehill have taken the book and film on a Heavy Lifting Listening Tour which began in Ukiah — where the two not only reside but which was also near the 2018 Mendocino Complex Fire — in Feb. 2023 and has been held monthly, mostly in Northern California cities impacted by wildfires. The program will feature a display of Rice’s works, screening of “On Heavy Lifting” and a conversation between Whitehill and the audience, where she will read her own poems and invite audience members to share their work or stories. The event is not only a reflection on loss but also a celebration of community and resilience.
“The project explores a range of responses to loss as it considers what might lie beyond these difficult times, from creating space to name the darkness as the first stage of recovery from grief to building strength to tackle the unending work ahead,” Santa Cruz Public Libraries officials wrote in a news release.
The event is 2 to 4 p.m. Aug. 24 in the Community Room of the Felton Branch Library, 6121 Gushee St. For more information, go to Santacruzpl.libcal.com/event/12542943.