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A Fairfield native and graduate of the Maharishi School of the Age of Enlightenment, Taylor Ross navigates her world with eyes open. “I’m interested in amplifying or catalyzing the incredible. That’s my niche,” she says. She summarizes her ongoing experimentation with music and study of art (including a BFA from Carleton College in Minnesota) as “learning so you are better able to see what you are seeing.”

“It feels good,” she explains, “when I can bring another adult into that space of allowing wonder to creep in despite the reality of life.” Taylor doesn’t see this as naiveté, rather as “the ability to experience good and evil and open up again to the wondrous things that continue and change. This has been a huge part of my growing up,” she says, quickly adding, “not that I’m grown up.”

Taylor found a perfect venue for her work at the 2014 True/False Film Festival, an annual film/art festival in Columbus, Missouri.  About the time she was figuring out gears and mechanisms on a wood sound machine, a friend told her about the annual event and the 2014 theme, “The Mechanics of Magic”.

Taylor Ross: watercolor by Dylan McKinstry.

Her entry Juniper & Fyn was made possible by her collaboration with friend and mentor Mark Stimson. “Mark has so much experience in mechanical, electrical, and artistic projects,” she explains. “Mark and others helped me take my dream to build a sculpture using an ancient Japanese automaton design, Kurakami, and make it real. I put in my own flavor in by adding my wooden sound machine to present this ancient idea in a new way.”

The sculpture was created in 3 states over the course of 4 months.  In Iowa, Taylor worked with Mark Stimson “to build the base out of local White Pine and Black Locust harvested the year before.”

In Colorado, Taylor worked on the design and functionality while writing the music. Taylor unabashedly “likes the idea of making music that is true to my own spirit which is not dogmatic, trying to force anything, just expressing joys, sorrows and wonders.” With its carefree style and unique instrumentation, Taylor’s composition Inside/Out is a stand out example of her style on the album Juniper & Fyn. The collaborative album features Colorado musicians, Chimney Choir, and Lake Mary with Taylor singing and playing banjo, guitar, and pump organ on her compositions.

The final six weeks of the project found Taylor in Missouri with “two Festival volunteers, a father and son” helping to machine parts, build the dulcimer, and assemble the piece.

taylorrosspicWhat’s Happening Next: Taylor and Mark Stimson are working on a houseboat made from local woods, to sail down the Mississippi to Baton Rouge. Artists, musicians and writers will come for short residencies “to be a voice for the river, a modern journalistic synthesis through creative people.”

Taylor will return to the 2016 True/False Festival with Lay of the Land, a project of wandering, discovering and gathering plants in Iowa and Missouri. Gathered materials from native, uncultivated plants will be harvested for their fibers or dyes, and then woven into a garment completely untouched by machines or chemicals.  Taylor describes the project concept as “the necessity for improvisation, while having a deep knowledge-base of what one might be looking for…” as an analogy “for creating and designing futures.”

Mo Ellis is inspired by art, issues, and progressive ideas. Mo Ellis’ online and print contributions as a writer, editor, website & mobile app project manager, PR and online media director 
have appeared at: "O" magazine, The Huffington Post, The New York Times, The Des Moines Register, Surface Design Journal, The Iowa Source, KRUU-FM, Iowa Public Radio, Dr. Mercola and Dr. Oz.