Visual artist Vanessa Renwick has created a new installation that speaks to the “hodgepodge of horrible” we meet in modern life — a multi-screen installation featuring everything from tsunamis to coal train fires, neighborhood demolitions to cats killing songbirds — the things that leave you unable to do anything but shake your head. The work also deftly addresses how we reel ourselves back from that edge.

We can’t actually say the full title of Renwick’s installation at Portland Art Museum’s APEX Gallery (“Next-Level F—ed Up”) on air, but we can tell you how affecting and oddly poignant it is. Here’s a bit of our conversation.

Read the full story: http://www.opb.org/radio/article/tsunamis-demolitions-and-dog-poop-vanessa-renwick-takes-it-to-the-next-level