glasgow, scotland (2005)
Surviving Memory ‘2005’
painting
Public Resonance: Massada, Isreal (2005)
massada is located near the southern end of the dead sea, in Israel, and holds a story from the history of the Jewish people. a story told from a number of perspectives over time.
if you were to go there today, you would hear about the Jewish martyrs who held the Romans at bay.
having plenty of water and supplies, they threw stones and ceramic containers of water onto the romans below who were trying to invade the mountaintop fortress.
the romans had no water, and were dying from thirst.
it seemed that the Jews atop the mountain of massada could hold out forever, if it were not for a certain change in the tactics of the romans.
instead of building their access ramp themselves, the romans began using Jews from other parts of the country that they had captured.
these people atop the mountain are represented as the last holding out against the roman invasion.
the Jews no longer would throw stones down on their brethren and conquer was inevitable.
as the modern story goes, the people atop the mountain had to make a decision.
would they submit and become slaves and ‘have to renounce their god?’
or was there another option?
it is said that, from historical evidence, that there was a decision made to make mass suicide.
the men killed their wives and children, and then themselves. the last man committing suicide.
this is cited as a heroic act, and that these people would rather give up their lives than their faith.
a friend of mine who was studying modern israeli politics was doing a project on massada.
he told me another story.
that this religious and zionist story was created as a political and religious myth to support the acquisition of Israel in the 20th century.
we all create and tell stories, and we am fascinated how the same story can be told for very opposing opinions.
this is the beauty and vulnerability of stories, and these tales are the foundation for almost all of our activity.
this project was enacted from my memory of this story, and its coloring through this site being absolutely covered in a thin dust of tourists today.
with a certain story in mind, anything within the site is a piece of evidence.
at every turn in the snake trails progression up the mountain there was made a quick ink drawing in brown ink, which absorbed into the stone, and soon would fade in the hot desert sunlight.
the progression of these drawings is like the progression of the story in the mind and through time.
images of the romans,
of jews holding out on top of the mountain,
of suicide
and of tourists with camera’s documenting suicide.
eventually we gained the top, and met my father who took the gondola, which makes this mountaintop tourist site accessable to a larger number of people.
all of the works are labelled in roman numerals.
we wonder what sites similar to this around the world were to record the versions of the stories that people walk away with,
and incorporate them into the representation of the site, a living story, unselfconsciously repeating its function and meaning through time.
we wonder how this story that we tell of my interaction with this place will change by the next time we visit this site, or the next time we read this story here.
in one of the exhibition atop the mountain, in the ruins of one of the buildings, where they have traced the line of where it was rebuilt, there still exists some element of the paintings on the inside, like some mournful and faded flag of culture, in a site now rebuilt with religious and political stories.
if indeed you hold a story of this site, or of a similar progression of meaning within a ‘historical site’ we would love to hear it. click on the comment button below.
see other public resonance works here:
http://www.foolishnature.org/homely/cultural/public%20resonance/public%20resonance.html
Contours of History: 2005
The contours of history were traced by me, in the history of art, with a pencil. The dates are those of the dead artist. Many of these are studies from life (drawn while viewing the master works they depict) in the UK, France and Italy in 2005. the constant motion of the contour line wraps around the forms in the drawing as it evolves, like history, rewriting-drawing over-until an approximation of the original is attained. many of these i have yet to paint, though i like the bold simplicity of the line drawings.
29″-23″. pencil on paper.
1401-1428. 17″-12″. pencil on paper.
1401-1428. 17″-12″. pencil on paper.
1791-1824. 23″-29″. watercolor pencil and ink on paper.
1401-1428. 17″-12″. pencil on paper.
1499-1523. 17″-12″. pencil on paper.
1746-1828. watercolor and ink on paper.
1727-1788. 23″-29″. ink on paper
1528-1558. 17″-12″. pencil on paper.
1450-1523. 12″-17″. pencil on paper.
1606-1669. 23″-29″. ink on paper.
1598-1664. 29″-23″. pencil on pape
1457-1504. 17″-12″. pencil on paper.
1541-1614. 23″-29″. pencil on paper.
29″-23″. ink on paper.
1659-1734. 23″-29″. watercolor pencil and ink on paper.
here are a few of the original paintings from google:
Inverted Don
a process for getting a new perspective on works in progress. the downside is that often i like the inverted images better.
Making Tracks.
Every step taken, whether along the long road in relationship between people and nature, out on a wander through the hills, or retracing previous industry in the don valley, leave tracks that can be measured. Censored only by the ability to pay attention, tracks yield infinite minute detail revealing the form, habit and personality of every creature who sets foot on land.
a collection of symbols describing a map on the don river valley in toronto.
30″ x 40″ acrylic on canvas
2′ x 3′ acrylic on canvas, 2014
thriving tension of the don river valley, in toronto
environmental arts mentoring
can u tell what kind of plant this is?three people, one of which is 11 years old, draw studies of plants every week in order to learn about environmental arts. can u guess which one was done by the 11 year old?
mapping ‘mud creek watershed’
- 2014, 2’x4′, ink, acrylic, hand made sumac ink and silkscreen on canvas.
this painting (captured with a horrid tiny broken phone camera) depicts the ‘don valley brickworks park’ which encompasses the “Weston Family Quarry Garden” or the quarry restoration by the T.R.C.A., and “Evergreen Brick Works” on the redeveloped industrial pad.
mud creek is the stream which trickles its way down from mount pleasant cemetery, crossing under the belt-line trail (built atop of a 50’s railway built through the valley) to terminate in the ponds. mud creek was diverted once for use in brick production, again to make way for the railway, once more when the trail was leveled out of the railway, and finally 10-12 years ago when the trca began the pond restoration. giant crack willow have swelled ambitiously along the lower stretches of mud creek, sucking up the abundance of nutrients washed down from human activity in rosedale. crack willow do send out clusters of showy seed into the wind, but they have a more obnoxious method of propagation: they replant themselves. many species do this obviously, but on certain slopes you can trace the evidence of successive generations of willow or apple, growing to a certain size and then dropping significant branches downhill/downstream where they root quickly back into the ground. moving upstream, or towards the top of the map, there is a stout bunching of oak, in a branching stem pattern suggestive of past harvesting, which has fallen over a large pool of oddly blue/green water, where mud creek emerges from its subterranean adventures in a spiral steel pipe. where mud creek merges through the successive ponds, down under an electrical building (oddly) before being divided in two and into the Don river i have seen giant prehistoric looking snapping turtles with all kinds of growth on its back, beavers, muscrat and countless other wild signs of regeneration.
when first approaching the capacity for the ‘don valley brickworks park’ to fuel educational activities by the charity which redeveloped the site, Evergreen, we realized the experience and learning gained by kids in our first experimental programs needed a way to be recorded. the first foray into mapping the park was carried out through google map, foot, and historical sources. hilariously we found that a pond indicated on public maps was actually a shadow cast by a hill on the google map. many such intricate crossroads between the published perception of the shape of the park and its reality when walked through. this silkscreen map then was mounted on paper and used to record the significant sightings and experiences of kids in the first green city adventure camp at the brickworks. 
from these initial mapping exercises, time was taken to reflect upon the most appropriate materials and venue for recording this ‘dirt time’ in nature, and displaying it to the public. eventually, a year or so later, the ‘Natural History Emporium of Mystery’ was installed near the boundary between Evergreen Brick Works and the Weston Family Quarry Garden. The Emporium features the same map lines sandblasted into an old schoolhouse slate for use with chalk, and a nature museum display mounted on an old 21′ heritage metal lathe from the brickworks. see the emporium here.
the painting pictured is one more iteration of interpreting the ‘don valley brickworks park’, trying to trace trough time the meandering of mud creek and its many inhabitants.
Wind Birds: part of a true tail of wind turbines, hitch-hikers, and how they effect the local birds of central France.
These paintings were made both as emblems for the 30 day journey spanning the northern half of France and into Holland back in 2007, and as sweetener to the deal proposed to those who had hired us to stand in for avian experts and create an environmental impact study to interpret how wind turbines effect birds. This task we did diligently, not fully understanding the implications to the health of the bioregion, crafting a study littered with fully articulated impacts on birds as well as lofty goals for mitigating impact-peppered with a strong disclaimer-we are artists, not biologists (see excerpts here). I exchanged the ten paintings, plus the environmental impact report for transit back to montreal on a cargo ship, and funding for my friends project in India kick-starting traditional craft economies.
each bird portrait was made half from memory, half imagination, then the closest relative identified in the field guide to birds we were seeing in the farms and fields proposed for the wind turbine project. each work is titled for this bird, and the descriptions on the back are like the game, two truths and a lie, each one holding two true facts and one imagined one.
this method of painting from imagination and memory relies on spending weeks in the field observing birds behavior and identifying them in a field guide. this sourcing of imagery for painting relies on first hand knowledge to be able to then use the strongest memories and impressions from the physical experience of being close to actual birds to paint from. this is an important distinction to me since it relies on drawing people into connection with the natural world, going out to observe and eventually find empathy with the winged sentinels of the forest.
each work is ink and watercolor, 9″ x 11″ and stitched to cardboard, as these were the most efficient materials i have found to use while camping and hitch-hiking.
a story of birds and wind turbines in the massif central mountains of France.
the following photographs and text contain a true story which unfolded through the fields, mountains and motor-ways of france in 2007. there is nothing more to describe. i love to create new experiments in how imagery and commentary can stand in for conventional dry storytelling, therefore, the story may connect to the images, or it may not. see what you can imagine through the visuals and text. enjoy. in a sense the paintings above are the conclusion, as they marked the end of this adventure, and were left in the executive offices of the wind turbine company who hired us, the ceo saying as i departed; “my wife will love these….”
beginning with the rising of the sun, in a small wood holding the cold remnants of a food fire from the night before, tilly and i pack our bags.
we want to catch the Spanish transport truck driver who said he was leaving for Spain at 9 am. exiting the forest, across a mono-cultural field of unknown crops (an appropriate breakfast guess is that they are cereals) and crossing the motorway on a bridge which spans two roman roads.
the new concrete vein intersecting the old artery to the heart of Rome. in ten minutes and five degrees of warmth that the sun is giving to the awakening world, we arrive to a lack of greeting.
the packed truck parking lot from the night before is abandoned, those who have slept and drank their fill of a legally required eight hours, have moved on as the sun thought about moving up.
Tilly is disappointed. we canvas the station, her fluent French allowing more conversational requests for lifts south. this interaction cheers her. despite this, three hours pass.
am worried about losing sight of her when she is asking truck drivers for lifts while i am at the exit with my thumb out on one hand and a sign in the other. a fine line between paranoia and caution
we are settled past the stage of being frustrated at people not stopping, and silently resolve to remember there is nothing to do about it, and waiting becomes a breathing exercise, or playful ways of displaying the sign, or some skin to passing drivers. at the exact moment we forget that people stopping is a part of reality, a sedan pulls up with a trunk full of hay and horse hair.
Bert and Greg are now our vessels to flow from the forest into the Sheraton hotel at the Paris airport, to be refilled with a five course lunch.
we now, within the hour, work for a multinational company, and are a little dazzled. in the car, along the Paris vein, we are asked if we know anything about birds. and we ask fourteen questions.
we are like reporters soliciting information out of general curiosity, and are paid with much information about our escorts, and their role.
Greg is the president of INNOVENT, a company based in France that he started in 1993, before wind power was in fashion or even profitable in France.
his first turbine was erected to make his factory more energy efficient (and as an added benefit more ecologically sound, saving the world through saving money).
Greg’s first turbine tumbled to the parking lot, and the turbine blades which caused the problem are still sitting in the yard. he fixed it, and is now in the process of installing turbines all over France.
in response, we ask another question. why do you want to know if we know anything about birds?
he tells a story of a beautiful, carefree week in the French mountains looking through binoculars at avian intricacies.
being a sucker for a good story i believed it wholeheartedly, and began imagining the beauty, of a british columbian mountain, and long days of stillness and quiet in the forest, and the potential of snow and rain and needing to survive, of climbing trees for health and joy and to keep the direction in this remote alpine forest site.
tilly wasn’t responsive to his story, probably because she is more honest, and knows she doesn’t know anything about birds, except they can fly
i accept, and we take flight past the Sheraton, and into the massif central mountains.
over the Sheraton lunch we overhear, and oversee the signing of 20 million euro contracts, between the Finnish supplier and our two friends and patrons, Bert and Greg. Erkki , the fin, doesn’t disguise his excitement when his profit is signed on paper, and he immediately snatches the signed sheets as a child, but no one seems to notice.
Erkki gives gifts of vacuum sealed caribou from the Finnish wilder-land, and Greg asks Bert to get the innovent socks from the car urgently.
see a window, and jump through it to find that i would have been better off inside. i give a drawing to Erkki, hoping that it would act as a gift from Greg and Bert
the paper, on which i happened to draw wind turbine in the Scottish landscape, with connecting roads and sky as a seminal step in the HOW IS THE WEATHER project, transforms into a personal gift from me, making the lack of reciprocal gifts from Greg and Bert all the more clear.
sox are given and all is forgiven, but this moment brands itself somewhere in the back of my mind. PARDON ME, COFFEE BREAK. BRB blindly tilly and i are escorted by train to central France, a distinctly different mode of transport through the landscape, more impersonal even though your are in much closer proximity to so many people, maybe because of this.
while there were people willing to drive out of their way to take us to somewhere we needed to go when hitching, some folk wouldn’t give up the seats that our tickets had reserved for us, when asked politely. we were relegated to the play area, a mock 2D city where the children can drive around aimlessly, without any real ability to change anything, a feeling probably repeated in their teenage years.
this marks a beginning of the change in our thought patterns. we now are almost in Vichy, and have to decide what supplies we will need for the mountains, since innovent is sponsoring this bird-watching, and we have to decide what our stories are.
stories are fun to make up when you don’t have to. when we excitedly sat down on Greg’s leather seats, we were wandering Jewish artist who mumble, when we exited, we became biologists…wandering mumbling bumbling Jewish artistic biologists.
i changed my pants to prove it. we were now to play a game akin to so many others we had as rebel clowns, but without the face paint, and group of silly support to keep up in character.
we are introduced to Jean Claud Dupris, who has been waiting for two and a half hours at the train station, because he and his moustache did not get our message.
Jean Claud dupris and his moustache unceremoniously, but respectfully dump our stuff in his family van, and hustle us towards unknown destinations.
it is hard to explain to someone that we would rather be outside camping in the rain than inside a hotel, and harder if you are pretending that you are a biologist and not just a nature addicted tramp, or a pair of them.
in the leather seated horse carriage which brought us to Paris, Jean Claud was painted as a primitive man. someone who is rural. and also someone who can be somewhat stubborn, and if this is the case, we were instructed to say that we expect him to fulfil our needs to facilitate the project being completed, and if he has a problem with this, then call Greg. this, as is my general experience, confrontational position was fruitless, and made a somewhat stubborn moustache a downright donkey.
tilly was the one who had to spin the yarn, to weave out biologist’s lab coats out of our art education.this, as is my general experience, confrontational position was fruitless, and made a somewhat stubborn moustache a downright donkey.
standing in the lobby of the hotel that Jean Claud drops us in, we are asked publicly how many beds we require by the patron and her Dalmatian.
tilly, in her rhythmic ignorance of the sick minds of men, says of course, one. hysterics are building.
the ridiculousness of the situation are bursting forth, and i give a stranger drinking at the bar with a missing tooth a Monty python wink wink.
tilly misses the joke, but it sets the stage for me to see the humour in Jean Claud ignoring our pleas to sit down and talk about what we need from him.
as it was somewhat similar to sucking water from rock, we let him lizard his way out the door and home, with a 9:00 meeting planned.
five weeks have passed, and i have only recounted two days, the pace shall have to be more of a summary.
after Jean Claud leaves, tilly and i sit down to a ritual Friday night meal, real hysteria breaks in and we find perspective.
what the hell has just happened.
we awake in the woods, and are escorted through Paris’ five star food to Jean Claud and a hotel meal, from transient to responsible faster than you can say mammal.
one of our first tasks as biologists, once we managed to create enough heat to run a vehicle off Jean Claud the following day, and just are brought to a little village without our imagined needs being met, was to find out if birds were mammals.
let it suffice to say that the learning curve was an acute angle.
this is only the first chapter of a novel story, which is just as long.
in the future i would like to elaborate, to turn it into a different medium.
i would like to record tilly and i speaking about this story, and animate that with these photo’s.
but possibly simpler is better and we will let this story be as much as it is, enjoy it. i’ll elaborate if and when i make time.
ingrained: tracking the grain of plywood with ink.
"In the pine top of my work table, the dark knots are boulders standing up in the river of grain, sending eddies and ripples spinning downstream, delivering the driftwood thoughtof a new journey to be taken, through trees." Roger Deakin, 'wildwood, a journey through trees', pp.32, Penguin Books, Toronto, Canada, 2007.
This will become a cycle of 50 paintings within the next three months, which will be mounted so that the water systems that are mapped out of the existing grain drain into each other and become a real document of the grain, i.e. a map of the landscape and conditions which the tree originally grew in, as well as an imagined topography created through the inferrence of grain patterns into landforms and features.
After spending literally years following the symbols of maps while traveling and sometimes without the assistance of visibility, like on the tops of mountains, i have used the symbols to guide me safely to shelter. this training made it impossible to not imagine these landforms in the plywood grain, as soon as i sketched them out i began to see rivers, lakes and water-systems, mountains, and could infer where i would look for clean water or shelter.
both the process of tracking grain in industrial plywood, understanding what different lines may indicate in terms of climate or sunlight and the process of imagining topography into grain resonate with the desire to square up and subjugate natural organic forms to geometric, and therefore human-centric patterns. making round spiral grain lay flat with glue and heat. imagining the bridge you would build over the river, the rectangular house on the cliff, which catches southern light, etc.
i am certainly not knocking the desire to square up nature, since the countless hours trying to master broad axes and hatchets, to achieve those straight lines needed to say, make a table out of dynamic cedar grain, would make that insult a little insincere. what i take issue with, and reflect through these paintings is that more often when you ask someone to define what wood is, it comes in 2″ x 4″ instead of growing out there somewhere.
outside of these political views, its quite calming and fun to follow a pattern, especially one which can reveal new insights into how trees grow and what the activity of mapping expresses about our intentions towards wilder landscapes.
speaking of which, i am now going out to discover some tracks left by creatures dwelling in the ravine, by the marks left in this, toronto’s first real snowfall!
foolishNATURE 