Mike Curran
Area of Concern
Organized by Mike Curran and Tom Bierlein︎︎︎ at Crosby Farm Regional Park in September 2022, Area of Concern was a public program that included a site-specific installation, live happenings, and a publication︎︎︎ centered around the emerald ash borer—an insect introduced to Minnesota in 2009 that is expected to cause the functional extinction of ash trees.The program invited artists and audiences to engage with the broader theme of “living through extinction,” expanding perspectives on interrelated issues that the ash borer is tangled up in, including ecological grief and legacies of colonialism, displacement, and exploitation.
The Installation
09 - 10/2022
Assembled by Tom Bierlein, the structure was built from the wood of two infected ash trees that were felled at a nearby home in Apple Valley. Functioning as both a temporary gathering space and a quiet place for reflection, it offered a site to sit with the forest as it adjusts to the loss of its leading tree. The structure’s plain, exposed heartwood mirrored the bare bark of the trees it foregrounded, evoking something like a memorial while also subtly suggesting an architecture made from the mess of our past.
Installation images by Melissa Vang.
Assembled by Tom Bierlein, the structure was built from the wood of two infected ash trees that were felled at a nearby home in Apple Valley. Functioning as both a temporary gathering space and a quiet place for reflection, it offered a site to sit with the forest as it adjusts to the loss of its leading tree. The structure’s plain, exposed heartwood mirrored the bare bark of the trees it foregrounded, evoking something like a memorial while also subtly suggesting an architecture made from the mess of our past.
Installation images by Melissa Vang.
Happenings
Basketmaking Demonstration with April Stone
09/17/2022April, a member of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Ojibwe, is widely recognized for her working knowledge around weaving baskets made from the fibers of black ash trees. During this demonstration, visitors were invited to learn about this process and tradition, gather splint material from an ash log, and try their hands at weaving.
Attuning to
09/24/2022"If you zoom in close enough, could you still see the place where your feet end and the soil begins? What if you zoom out far enough?" In a performance from dance artist Kaya Lovestrand, audiences were invited to tune into the sights, sounds, and smells of the floodplain forest, cultivating an attentiveness useful for navigating the feelings of ambiguous loss that accompany both personal and ecological grief. A talkback with Lovestrand followed the performance.
Plant Walk with Hope Flanagan
09/27/2022Hope, a Seneca elder and the community outreach and culture teacher at Dream of Wild Health, led an educational plant walk through Crosby Farm. Participants learned more about the cultural connections between this place and Indigenous peoples, and expanded their understandings of the numerous plant relatives beyond the ash tree that are found throughout the park, highlighting the interconnectedness of this floodplain forest ecosystem.
All event images by Nayelie Avalos.
Publication
The publication accompanying Area of Concern included new writings by Mike Curran, Kaya Lovestrand, Su Hwang, and Kathryn Savage. Read each of their contributions below:
Mike Curran: Introducing Area of Concern︎︎︎
Kaya Lovestrand: Attuning to [practice]︎︎︎
Su Hwang: Invasive Species︎︎︎
Kathryn Savage: Trespass︎︎︎
Click here to view a digital version of the full publication︎︎︎
Mike Curran: Introducing Area of Concern︎︎︎
Kaya Lovestrand: Attuning to [practice]︎︎︎
Su Hwang: Invasive Species︎︎︎
Kathryn Savage: Trespass︎︎︎
Click here to view a digital version of the full publication︎︎︎