The
Monongahela Conference
11:30 am Robin
Intro:
Tim – Artists working to
influence spaces we care about
Diverse approaches with clear intent
Shared purpose: want need desire
pursuit of change
Request for
respect of differences
Frame for
discussion:
Spatial and
Discursive form of the public realm
Visioning
the Future
-Lyrical expression
-Critical Engagement
-Transformative Action
Day Plan
Thursday/Friday
– goals / intentions and methods / processes
Friday
afternoon/Saturday – implementation in river town dialogue
Background:
3 years of
3rivers 2nd nature
looking
at cultural mindset of the post-industrial community
advisory
committee being assembled to help bring in people for future actions
Reiko:
Artistic
Subject Matter: life of nature – finding personal identity through
contemplation of nature
Experience
at wildlife refuge center – supporting life became Reiko’s practice
Releasing
animals, where are the released? How do we create an environment that is
condusive to human life and animal life alike
Artist in
Residency – butterflies hatched in
fennel and leave through open window, later return to the site
-
later
installation “summer”
-
Cho-MU
(butterfly dream) collaboration with dance company
-
’91-’93
Public Art Project: Cho-En (butterfly garden)
focus relationship between place, plant,
butterfly, human
questions: how do I connect to other people?
How do we meet together? How do we understand each other?
Move to
Nine Mile
Run Project
-
investigated plants, what is growing?
-
-
Tricycle,
books made of honeysuckle one of the introduced species
-
Poison
Ivy (lyrical expression)
3 Rivers 2nd
Nature
-work with scientists; what
questions should we ask of nature?
-Engage with community
“Relationship
between human and nature is never and equation, always a miracle to me”
Tim:
Interested
in strategic knowledge: what can we reveal that will produce strategic
knowledge?
Mapping a lot of things; restoration potential etc.
Transformation
from 1970 to today – 30 year recovery to be celebrated
Buckwheat
grown on a island in the mon
Streets to
riverfront we blocked off, access lost
Visions for
the future:
Hays Hill
Side
-
Extract
remnant coal
-
Build
casino!?!
How can
scientists and artists help people see rivers in new way?
Take people
out on the river
Get people
engaged
Is it art
or not? –who cares
Work
dependant on CONTEXT
Some work
100% process
Others more
visual manifestation
Working
with
These
people had already been working in towns and had some connections
Towns
select for grants – Park Service consults on water access/use issues
Stream
daylighting – could be center point for revitalization
In the
process of the project, the racial tensions of the town emerged
Difficult
bringing Hispanic population into the process reported prior to start of the
project
Artists
didn’t find this difficult
They spent
time trying to connect to people to identify interested constituencies and link
them to the project
Not much in
the way of funds
Working
with at risk use, students – created a mural and one other project around the
flora and fauna of the creak
Community
took over the festival and throughout artist ideas taking on their own ideas
Worked with
local college and girl scouts
Tilman
Oregan:
Gorgeous
slew
BUT mostly
experienced from the highway, doesn’t look inviting
Small group
of citizens wanted trail through the area
Connected
to local artists to develop a plan
How to use
green space, relate to history and the slew
5 rivers
come onto the area – early settlers used their hands to indicate location, each
finger representing a river
Advocated
the restoration of a house set for demolition
This will
become an info center for the trail
One artist
bushwhacked a trail – low budget solution
Festival –
kids made biodegradable sculptures to put in the slew
10 years
previous
Turning
point project:
-
followed
migration of cotton
-
spoke
with former share croppers
-
initial
interest was mostly ecological
-
interview
technique: sit on ground, look at feet, sculpt portraits of their feet out of
soil
-
meaning
– dependency of culture upon the hands and feet and work of other
-
changed
relationship of artist to other people, working with people more
-
video
of conversation documentation
-
photographed
cotton picking process
First bio-sculpture (1966?)
Mosses and
wetland plants
“I am you”
– looks like hands but based on microscopic patterns of plants
Sculpture
may be used to filter rooftop water in NYC
Germany-wetland
sculpture – human hands with moss growing on them, reaching into water
Mill Creek
– awarded for most polluted urban create
Project to
reclaim this creak
4 Pilot
projects
1 project =
water from parking lot and ballfield collected and cleaned as it passes to the
creak
Storm water
project
Had planned
to remove islands – instead Jackie and Angelo got them to save the islands
Creating a
bridge, which they all a dock because you can get money if you’re building a
“dock”
Bio-Sculpture
imitates and includes native plants
Angelo:
120 acre
park
Using soil
from the ponds to reference Seminal Indian burials
Seminals
helping to design playgrounds ontop of these mounds
Using
native plants from everyday Seminal life
Dump site
will be re-vegetated with native grasses
Educational
program allows kids to plant native species
“Lawns
don’t belong in
Painter
trained in
1970 – bought a farm in
No
background in biology, geology
Coal
companies would mine the coal, push spoil to the side, extract all the coal and
claim backrupcy
Moonscape –
how do you reclaim dead earth
Rock to
collect silt
Within five
years the area was revegetated
Set out to
reclaim the entire 23 acre site
Looked for
ways to save money in the process of mine reclaimation
Created
stupas using existing form and saved around 70K
Dead mound
with spiral of vegetation
Living
mound with spiral of coal
Studied indigenous plants
Re-vegetated the entire site as food for turkey population
Doubled turkey pop. in one
year
Acid mine drainage
Brought beavers to the site
They built a damn with helped improve the water quality
Cattails were planted in another area
Stupas were never meant to be maintained
Trees are growing in quickly
Deep mine project in
Problems: Bony pile –
bad coal
Bore holes
Two methods for solution:
Passive
Active – putting water trough system that must be maintained
Outdoor educational center
Geared toward middle school students
7 holding ponds demonstrated the process of cleaning the
water
They went to the churches to connect with community
Clergy brought people to the project
Organized the planting of trees
Great community event
Community input on design was a Disaster
In the end Angelo worked with designers to create an outdoor
classroom
All groups involved (Trout Unlimited, Ducks Unlimited,
Advise: Bring everyone to the table, involve everyone possible as soon as
possible
Open Discussion:
Anne Rosenthal – work is catalyst for bringing people together, education,
participation
The
work seems secondary to the process, work is an acknowledgement of
the process
Helen- “Community continues after us, but the work continues after the
community”
Laurie: are the communities cohesive –
this element hasn’t been represented in the presentations. . .
Jackie – projects have taken months getting off the ground because of disagreement,
Some
disagreements are irreconcilable, each project is different
Angelo – Stupa project, people protested because they thought he was building
a burial
Mound. People heckled
them outside the courthouse. But it’s
miscommunication –“as artists no matter what we say people are going to find
some way to disagree”
Laurie – yes miscommunication, but doesn’t this represent a difference in
priorities?
Mark – Community means different things
Like minded
people
Collections
of differences
Malcolm – people in metropolitian cities assume membership of a global
community
There
is no such thing as community, but perhaps in very small places
They
all hate each other but hate outside more
Different publics, different communities
Tom – has to do with belief systems
Do these projects try to shift belief systems?
Tim – Common ground is found in mutual advantage
Helen – Most important issue - we’re an all white group. This is an issue in dealing with closed communities. I wish it were different.
Tim – resolution to this question might be able to be addressed over the
next couple of
Days - struggled
withwho to bring in to diversify this further, racial diversity is a hard one
to achieve in eco/art community
Jane – Environmental issues are not exclusively white middle class, there
are others out there who want to express themselves. But the language, access isn’t available they
will be excluded.
Jackie – time and trust issues are difficult.
Example – working with Seminals ¾ of time together passed before they
felt ok with being forthcoming. Seen this over and over.
Trust is built over time.
Erica – when non-native plant was introduced to increase turkey pop, was
there investigation into what this increase would do to the rest of the
ecosystem?
Angelo – went to the gaming commission and spoke with other farmers in the
area. First suggestion from farmers was
Quail. Game commission said this is not
practical. Ga
me commission said turkey. Went with the commission and community,
trusted feedback
Erica – concern with artists without bio
background taking on projects without concidering reprocussions.
Different commissions and services have different opinions and
agendas. Find renegade biologists –
they’re on the ground
Dan – Jackie’s comment about communication/intimacy – sometimes you can
have the most intense conversations when in a car and not looking at
eachother. Changing the rules (eye
contact etc.) allows different kind of listening. Idea for conference where
people sit on park benches together and look out. Talk without looking at each other.
Mark D.
Formerly of bread and puppet – influenced by these types of
puppetry
Geographical and cultural diversity of puppets
People use the materials at hand
Art a bridge btw the people and the place they live – the
materials and the meanings of place
Extensions and amplifiers of ideas and meaning – through
sound image scale and movement set in a social context
Community expression foremost in traditional puppetry
contexts
Symbolic meaning
How do we get power of puppetry to communities groups and
kids using cardboard and covered over with colored papers etc and staple pliers
Species and puppets – not a designer from outside who goes
and gets input, goes away to create the plan and then returns, instead….
Arts bridge people and place
How people in the community read the relationships between
social and ecological
Ecological practice and social practice
Document their observations
Journals photo nature walks etc etc
Then gather up all the documents, put it in a database, and
put into gis to create a map of town…with rivers,
roads, etc, plus contacts of the people who have made documentation of a place
so they can be found and contacted. Layerable with
traditional GIS material.
Then build performances – drop in types of puppetry – based
on peoples’ long term personal investigations and observations and turn them
back into community expression
Erica Fielder
Looking for connections between interest as a naturalist and
as an artist – combiing image making interpretive research and writing and
image making
From Mendocino/
The idea of watershed as home area – within 7 days all the
fluids in the body are replaced by the water drunk – so if drink from a certain
location body becomes tributary
Written nature guide that can be taken along for walk in
multiple locations – not site specific that takes into account the
53 senses and sensitivities – sensual and sensuous
experiences to help people fall in love with the earth
project with middle school kids – art in
science class – looking at migratory patterns – making art for the migrating
species – compass visible to birds from the air
sensory experiences of nature
finding ways to return something back to
the earth in recompense for all that we have taken from the earth
salmon bones offered to people to return
to the streams they encounter
saspostcards – people tell about their
experience returning the bones from various locations around the country
bird feeder hat project watershed
education and story sharing with people from Mendocino and tourists
talk one on one over 6 weekends
mark their home watershed on a map
high school students didthe
conversations
watershed exchange of information and sharing
through stories some of which were video taped
Stephanie Flom
Background as naturalist in city parks
City art planning – worked to plan events – interface with
community memebers
CDC to open old theater in ?
Politics is bringing art to community as something that
sparks something that all communities need
Personal creative practice became garden making
Large public space to bring gardeners and artists working
developing
Connection btw environment and creativity
Persephone as metaphor that without art our lives are barren
Gardening creative process
Exhibition public product
Dialogue public and private
Acquired space along Bigelow
Phase one small garden and projects by the road at
Sycamore arches
Cotton/okra family history and story
Stephanie’s garden – of light sensitive plants along the
road to be facing the road as people passed
The Magic Penny Garden
Based on the love of giving plants from home garden and
telling the stories attached to the source of the plant
Videotaped the stories and write in journal pages to tell
the story connected with the plant
The communities around the curto park – made gardens in
communities
One in the Hill one in Polish Hill
The Mayfly project
The first time that the may flies came to pgh for 105 years…
corresponding to images that were coming out of a sort of first time image
making practice – assembled multiples for eco art show
May fly cutouts in the skinny building
Dance project
Interactive art piece with magnetic pieces kids could play
with
And signage with the stories of the eco significance of the
mayfly and the stories of the rusolki nymphs
Discussion Period
These projects create communities – non abstract
Helen
In order to work, a community must be created in the place
to work – sometimes as strangers get to see some things that people who are
Caring about the place is communicated and that develops
trust
Erica – takees a lot of time to make friends – listens intently and doesn’t
Bridge btw what is important to you personally and the
community of sharing
Christine
Intermediate tools – the means through which the dialogue
flows – takes something out of context – whatever it is that you are talking
about – there I s the the thing and the representation of the thing
Suzi
When the community is already existing
and artists go into something that is already formses
Or issue of creating the commuity through the art
The issue of trust
Is it of any values -- what is creating the community –
the making and the participaroty aspect
Sig of work – the community that is created
The object made
The environment that may have been healed
What is intention inevitability the feedback or the fallout
or the intention
Lonliness need feeling of inclusion
Brett – notion of participant – the question of inside and outside is
Building community becomes a drone that is hard to put
fingers on – or get stuck on the word and using it too much
Mark
Community is an emergent property with what happens in a
complex system – if it happens it emerges from the context or situation created
Can’t be created – can only emerge out of the system
Brett
Not instrumental relationship but about seeing yourself as a
participant – bring focus and skill
John
Being careful with generic community
Do this event and it will bring art to the community what
does that mean –
Through the work that went into the event and the time spent
in work
Brett
What are other words
City culture space power over personal life is reduced to a
minimum – very different than the idea of community
Suzi
Intentionality ? or not
Level of participation
community structure emerges through a
participatory consiousness
non spectatorial – becoming a
participant
when the artist departs does the
community dissolve if it is formed in the act of participation
Helen
Sometimes community is the way it is used is the other as
opposed to the self
Doesn’t like this – feels like manipulation
Don’t think of the community think of the friends
\people are interested in similar things
comm. As other
comm. As family but not family – similar
– close ethincal moral relationship
Jackie
Community is usually thought of as just good
Over history comms are formed and there is a trade off in freedom
Power structures – constraining aspects of it that we accept
Brett speaks
Limitation in ecology – how do you see that as a positive
aspects of it – how to acknowledge them
Community as a thing with things in it that we don’t always want
to see
Laurie
Community used – seen as lacking in something
Unless you are an activist practice – the funds and process
of seeking them in going to work\
Missionary position – is to be worried over
Not comfortable with commuity language
Marc
Community assumes that we can all function as a cluster
Tim
Is community the right word but there has to be
experimentation with social relationships and dialogical relationships
With something less than specific instrumental
Form and function of the public realm
ep
Erica
Successful comms have a deep spiritual base – sensory is a
path to that
ANN
Social justice model – group of peoplee recognize power
relations in a specific circumstance – bringing power into the discussion is
critical
Reiko
Difference btw group of people and community – people create
stories and then transmit those stories to others
People getting together in the service of some larger issue
– st bigger than you and more important than you - -the issue evokes passion
and nurture and mutual compassion
Serve a purpose larger than self that is defensible
Ann
Many come into a community that is not our own and work –
what are the issues there
Heller – the social for desire for nature (book)
We human beings have desire for the social
That desire has been subverted by capitalism into buying
stuff
Jackie
Restore and re-story
Nicola
Idea that we want to be part of something bigger than us –
disagree – it is actively produced and constructed by us
Nature – is constructed and produced by us
Nature is something bigger than us – it is and isn’t because
it is something we produce in and then also feel it is larger than us
Our work lies between the Possible
probable and the utopic
Seek to invent and play and create impprobale images
Pahes shift in own process of making
Analytincal critical thinking become background
Trust and then enact
77 first restoration piece
Art Park
On spoils pile
The endangered meadows of
Fifteen meadows from
Ultimately harvested in a traditional fashion
Relocated to on the ground the location
Meadow model for rethinking farming of the future
Idea to effect the planting
practices in
They collect the seeds from the mother meadow and plant new
ones
Two transects of work
Work with the earth
Effecting the planning process on a great scale – process
that requires cultural urgency
Trying to build 600 000 houses in the green heart of
150 bil economic engine – can that be redirected in another
way
make a ring of wild polders around the
green heart– make parks btw your cities
ecologu needs continuity and contiguity
culture needs framing to maintain its
identity
we have it backwards – fragment
ecology and let cities meld into each other
where to put the houses then? The houses
go in a big circle around the heart
by theory of conversational drift –
ideas drift back into process after a period
make something that starts a new
conversation – proposal for analog farming that blends attention to bio
diversity, engineering of the land
harvested in semi-hunter gatherer fashion
all elements useful to people and
ecologically balanced
Stacy
Looking at nature
Developing an intimate relationship with things that you
can’t see
Hidden river
Creating diagrams to show
Things too small too vast too slow to fast
Nature is everywhere –even in the city there is nature
happening even if it is covered up
There was water here – where is it now – how can we get back
to it
Piece of the
Gathered as many waters as could
Water placed in cups
Covered streams cup upside down
Interesting things happen when you make a map big enough to
walk through – relation of the body to the map itself
Then the water grew its algae
In
Things that weren’t considered part of the community
Made insets in the sidewalk of species that were living in
the vicinity – small creatures
Collected water from her watershed took it to edinborough
and then did there to bring home
How people name water – in
Stormwater runoff
Archs and engineers try to get the stuff
Harvests rainwater from the roof to celebrate the substance
that is usually intended to be removed and hidden
Fresh Kill landfill proposal
Landfill purpose is to keep the liquid under control – water
runs off of rubberized mounds
Stormwater Park in Philly
Harvest rooftop rain and create pond structures little parks
while vacant lot is vacant
Acid Mine Drainage
Coats the lower end of the food chain in waterways
Alan comp (sp?) to create designs
to deal with AMD
Collaboration with three others
Treat water and talk about the site
Process should also show how the treatement of the water
works to get a sense of the water being changed
Winifred Lutz collab
Tidal area of river area -- water enters the piece and exits as
tide goes up and down
Watershed project with school – watershed sandblasted into
stone – tipped so that when it rains, the water flows through the piece and
into the
Discussion
LAURIE
-- open
relationship btw the visualization and the actualization
Dan- cant’ predict
Court of last –resort – odor of desparation –
When someone of the gorund level is desparate and artists
are cheap
Scale – and the detail that is possible on the small scale --
Larger projects so much unfinished about them
Helen
What happens is not just what is on the ground but a change
in how people are thinking about stiff
J Klein
Visualize ideas put the idea out so it can be taken up
When working at scale of region or country – indiv has to be
let go and poepl then have to
Christine
Ideas are out there – if you are thinking something there is
probably other people thinking the same way
Value is to stand up and say loudly – people have had the
ideas to themselves --
get it going
Tim
How to help it get accepted – or is just the wonder of life
in complex world that
Stacy
Making metaphors to understand what the thing is
Dan
How to get people to
Long term vision
Unraveling the carbon industry
Say now – what it would be like to live in a city with no
emissions
In 25 years the language wont sound
so crazy
Cant copntrol when things are taken up
Society developing the ears to hear something – can’t
organize that
Primo levy
Jackie
Sense – abut reason and perception
Get people to understand that they have a vested interest
Seed the ground of ideas
Malcolm
Growing ideas similar to grow corn – if the soil is goood it
will do well no usually somewhere in between
Has to do with conditions – complex but not mysterious -- if
mysterious nothing we can do.
complexity is hard to deal with but not
impossible
Society is much more constructed than earth – the concepts
the categories the place to intervene be that might be there – at the point of
conditions
The conditions are not given they are made and whatever we
do – they do not remain the same