Arise O Artist is a call to return to presence, to embrace the same courage, tenacity, and authenticity that emanates from the natural world. This exhibition explores slowness, deep listening, and interaction with nature through word and sound.

The title of this exhibition, Arise O Artist, is from one of Sage’s blackout poems which states, “Arise O Artist, the source of all heaven is in you.” This poem is a reminder to artists of the light within, a reminder of the power of art and creation that exists within us all.

Talking Flowers

2025 / Emily Sage / Sound, Tech, Tissue Paper, Mixed Media

Talking Flowers is an installation that explores the strength of women— soft yet unyielding, beautiful yet deeply transformative, and an incredible capacity for hope. Like flowers planted with care, the words we speak shape the world around us, creating life, home, and healing. This work honors generational investment in healing and growth, the enduring labor of love, the consistency of truth spoken in prayers and encouragement, the ways the women before me nurtured a corner of light in this world, not just for themselves, but generations to come.

Visitors are invited to lean in and listen, a simple, but effective interactive experience.

Let Your Heart Be Light

2024 / Emily Sage / Sound, Acrylic on Canvas, Tech

Let Your Heart Be Light is a touch triggered painting that brings art and music together in a quietly rebellious way, creating a piece that must be touched to be fully understood. It invites interaction and demands participation.

A depiction of blue skies inspired by the daydreamer and the hopeless romantic. An ode to having a soft heart and openness to love, art, beauty, and even silliness.

Instruction Read—

Please be gentle. She is delicate.

This is a touch-triggered painting designed to create a connection-both with the artwork and with each other.

By gently touching the silver frame around this description with one hand and the painting with the other, you will activate hidden sound elements, allowing the piece to respond to your presence.

With friends, the experience becomes even more magical. One person touches the silver frame while holding another's hand. The second person, with their free hand, touches the painting-completing an invisible circuit through the natural electricity in our bodies. How many people can you add to your chain?

Blackout Poetry

2020-2025 / Emily Sage / Mixed Media

Black out poetry has a unique way of bringing the voice of the subconscious to the forefront. It is more about discovering the poem than it is about writing it. It is working within the limits of what is on the page instead of having endless options of words, it is bowing to the resources in front of you and allowing a true collaboration to take place. Black out poetry is a search for resonating words that often find a way of speaking encouragement and conviction to the writer. Pictured are two series, one is original black out poetry, and the other is black out poetry without words.

This collection features 10 individual blackout poems of pages from different books. The Title of the greater collection, Arise O Artist, originates from a black out poem featured that reads, “arise, O artist, the source of all heaven is in you.”

Prism Window

2020 / Andy Pratt / Steel, Wire, Glass

This prism window was created as a set piece for a short film inspired by the song ‘Cold Moon By The Sea’ by Emily Sage. Rainbows are hopeful and nostalgic, mimicking the beauty of remembrance, this song was inspired by one of the black out poems on display which begins, “the same name after many years…” the short film speaks to grief, loss and remembrance, and the prism window is a sort of filter that allows the sunlight to refract into rainbows.

Life has moments that strip us of everything we thought we were. What if all that peace requires of us is openness? Openness to kindness. Openness to needing. Openness to joy. Openness to moments of quiet and deep breaths.

Refraction only requires an empty vessel in the sunlight. This piece is a reminder that grief and peace can go hand in hand.

Anthology for Listening Vol. II

2025 / Bureau for Listening / Printed Anthology

Bureau for Listening is a group based in Copenhagen, Denmark that is dedicated to fostering, engaging with, and caring for listening. Rooted in artistic practice, the Bureau prides itself on embracing experimentation, innovation, research to explore the vast possibilities of listening—welcoming failure, curiosity, and the unknown along the way.

Anthology for Listening Vol. II, is a transdisciplinary and experimental collection of critical and artistic engagements with listening as both a practice and a way of being. This second volume extends an invitation to engage deeply with the transformative, creative, and political dimensions of listening across diverse mediums and perspectives. Anthology for Listening Vol. II features over 60 artists and thinkers from around the globe offering diverse perspectives on the concept of listening.

This printed anthology by Bureau for Listening features Emily Sage’s Soundscape and Musical Installation, Sounds of Serenity Garden, which was featured in Charlotte SHOUT! 2023.

This exhibit also featured a projection of the Sounds of Serenity documentary, directed by Chris Lomartire. The documentary explores the unique musical explorations of Emily Sage, providing an intimate look into her creative process and music installation, ‘’Sounds of Serenity Garden.”