(upbeat music) - Well, you can be among the first in Utah to explore new exhibitions at the Finch Lane Gallery.

Works portraying identity, cultural heritage, and transformation will all be on display.

Todd Oberndorger and artist Bianca Velasquez joins us with an invitation that really has your name on it.

You guys have got to check out these works that are happening here.

Todd, tell me about the Arts Council's mission and how this is a part of it.

- We are part of connecting art with the community of Salt Lake City.

I oversee the visual arts programming, so in my case I would be the gallery director of Finch Lane Gallery.

We do six week sessions throughout the year, so it's year round visual arts programming.

- [Liz] And there are different things from galleries to music concerts and also we were just looking at the photo of the exhibit that was at the park, that was so wonderful.

- The Memory Grove Wake, the Great Salt Lake Project.

- Yeah.

- Hopefully we can keep that momentum going, drawing attention to the Great Salt Lake, but it was an incredible experience for all of us.

Thanks for coming out.

- Yes, yes.

It was wonderful.

I'm glad I saw it online.

I saw it on social media and I was like, I've got to be there.

Bianca, what is it like being a part of this exhibition, a part of this event that's happening?

- Well, yeah, it's a huge honor.

I've been pitching the show Prescribed Burn for a while now, and Todd and I were able to find an opportunity for that during the list of shows this year at Finch Lane.

So I'm really excited to be able to tell this story.

The show Prescribed Burn was inspired by a film called "Fire Tender" done by Roni Jo Draper, who is from the Yurok tribe, who's actually a local woman filmmaker and so it talks about cultural burns and the coming back to this matriarchal traditional practice that these tribes used to do.

So for me, I was like, this is such a beautiful message and I'm so excited to be inspired by the film, but I also really like the message of transformation and coming into a new form of self through destruction, which is the fire.

- Well, thank you so much for joining us.

Thank you for sharing this information.

If you would like to learn more about the Finch Lane Gallery's opening reception that's coming up July 31st from six to 9:00 PM just head to saltlakearts.org to get more details and to share this information with the friend 'cause I, you definitely will wanna talk about it with other people as well.

Thank you so much for watching "Contact", I'm Liz Adeola.

Philanthropy, Arts, culture.

It's what brings us together.

Hi, I'm Liz Adeola, the host of Contact, a show that connects you with local events and organizations that serve your community.

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