careers i admire: laurie baker

materialicious posted this inspirational obituary of architect laurie baker.  i never heard of him, but i’ll look up his work next time I’m at the CED library.

 Gandhian principles infused his work, as they did his life. “I now think Gandhi was right,” he wrote in 1975, “when he said that all the building materials should be found within five miles of the site”, and “Low-cost techniques should not be considered only for the poor — our aim should be to design only the simplest of buildings for all.”

careers i admire: daniel mccormick

“My approach to creating art relies on the interplay of restoration science and the creative process.”

Born in Oakland in 1950, he studied sculpture at UC Santa Barbara with James Turrell, who had been investigating the effects of light and space on human perception since the 1960s. Turrell insisted that art go beyond attractiveness “to direct attention and to precipitate change.” After receiving a degree in Environmental Design at UC Berkeley, McCormick wanted to “do more than witness and document the changes in our urban and rural landscapes.” Instead, he intervenes in the environment, with the goal of reestablishing the natural equilibrium.

I find equilibrium a difficult word, but the idea of intervention and interpretation rather than just observation, is what I really admire about McCormick’s perspective. He inserts his work into the creative forces of nature, they become a working and influencing part of a much larger process in a direct and intentional way, as opposed to the way we walk around without realizing our influence. His work is grounded in physical process. Each piece is ephemeral, its creation and disintegration are participatory. That participation reveals the process, brings it to our awareness, makes it perceptible and visible.

“You can’t replicate what was there in the historic flood plane, but you can recreate parts of the environment. The good thing about McCormick’s sculpture is that it doesn’t change nature, it just helps it along. In this case he created a small structure that replicates the function of a natural stream bank levee encouraging gradual deposition of sediments behind it. When the wall develops new growth from the riparian plants woven in, it will sustain itself for years to come and it will produce a lasting floodplain behind it that is structurally identical to a natural one. “
Martin Kammerer, Environmental Scientist
Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority.

“Most of my installations also include elements of community education and participation that serve to inform people about the natural systems at work in the lands surrounding their communities. The sculptures are my response to mixed cultural relationships with the land, such as ranching, agriculture, tourism, and increasing development — all of which have adverse impacts on riparian ecosystems.”

McCormick’s inclusion of students in the creation of his work is a thrilling opportunity for kids to experience the interconnected forces at work in a watershed. It’s like the gardening programs at school, where kids grow the food and then cook it and eat it, they become a part of the process, the gain a sense of inclusion in the natural world, they understand it and care about it. It’s local. It’s experiential and physical, engaging….so cool.

McCormick’s works have become larger and more complex over time. He now installs them with the help of members of the Marin Conservation Corps and students from schools like San Rafael’s Dominican University and the West Marin Elementary School in Point Reyes Station. “At first, some of the kids from West Marin didn’t want to get wet, but by the end, a lot of them liked getting down and dirty,” said McCormick, who taught the elementary students how to use surveyors’ tools to measure and explore local creeks. “When they started, they didn’t know much about the riparian environment or the life cycle of salmon. By the end, they were writing about it in a magazine they created, the ‘Coho Chronicles.’” Seventh-grade teacher Eric Ballatore said working with McCormick has become a highlight of his students’ year. “We took three or four trips this year, planted several hundred saplings and created a really dynamic filter in this little gully,” said Ballatore, whose classes have worked with McCormick for the past six years. “It’s a really unique experience because it’s something the students take a lot of ownership in. They realize they can come back and see the fruits of their labor five years down the road. Dan really respects local culture,” Ballatore said. “He doesn’t point fingers and say ‘agriculture is to blame.’ He says, ‘Here’s the problem, and here’s how we can deal with it.’ He’s very positive in that respect, and I think kids respond well to that.”

I would love to work with kids in this way: a combination of art, science and experiential education. This work inspires me to experiment with sculptural interventions in the landscape and also experiential education opportunities.  What other lessons can be taught with this approach?  How can sculptural interventions reveal and influence natural processes?
Resources:
McCormick’s Blog
Exhibit thru March 2: Bolinas Museum, 48 Wharf Road. Fri 1-5p, Sat 12-5p, Sun 12-5p.
Orion Article: Healing Sculpture
Arroy Seco Watershed Sculptures in Pasadena, CA
Art of Engagement, Peter Selz, UC Press 2006 (chapter “Toward a Sustainable Earth”)
Case Studies: Land/Water Art
Cutler-Shaw Mission Valley Branch Library, San Diego, CA

career i admire: edward burtynsky

Last night I rented the documentary manufactured landscapes in DVD. After the movie, I couldn’t help but feel like I should do something. Stop buying stuff. Sit at a desk to research and promote clean, renewable energy. It inspired change, transformation, transcendence, evolution, progression.

The images presented in the film by edward burtynsky, photographer, and jennifer baichwal, director, affected the intellect and the emotions by expressing the scale of our monumental impact on the landscape in terms of both space (the global reach, the scale of infrastructure) and time (the rate of change in booming China, the continued rootedness to our industrial dependence on fossil fuels and minerals, the rate of extraction versus geologic time).

In his images, Burtynsky often demonstrates this scale by contrasting a recognizable or sympathetic detail (a human, an everday object) within a sea of an unexpected surrounding context that’s visually evocate in its tone, repetition of form, directionality, and the depth or breadth of the perspective. Burtynsky’s mastery of his craft, photography, combined with his investigative and persistent drive to seek stunningly compelling subjects, views and perspectives create a visceral impact.

In a TED talk, he described an epiphany that brought new meaning to his work when he took a wrong turn on the highway and accidentally discovered an industrial landscape that evoked both beauty and disgust.  He found a theme, a reason to dig deeper. Through his prolonged visual investigation into the subject, he raises questions and doubts through the tension created as visual attraction leads to intellectual repulsion once the viewer processes the symbolism of objects and scale tied to an abstracted image. These are not everday images in terms of the landscapes of average American daily life, yet they are everday images for those supporting the average American daily life.

Specifically, I admire that he uses an artistic craft to observe and interpret a landscape pattern that brings an really important issue, a really big issue, an overlooked or difficult to understand issue to the forefront. He makes the connections between globalization, capitalism, climate change, pollution, environmental degradation, and land use real. His work brings clarity to a complex web of interrelations.

He had a medium, photography. He found an issue, industrialized landscapes. He built upon that theme into a body of work that stands for something. In the example of the oil tanker disassembly as subject, he heard about it first on the radio, connected it to his body of work, then traveled to Bangladesh to witness and capture the process.

I guess every artists wants to have an impact. I don’t think he started out his career by saying, “I want to change the world, I want everyone to realize how screwed up this place is and I want to find a solution.” It seems like he started out by wanting to investigate nature, his photos bordering on trite renditions of pristine nature. He found a more intriguing subject that questioned what is essential about the relationship between man and nature today? He used his craft to dig deeper, to find the most compelling examples, to witness the cause and effect, and to communicate the drama of it. He recorded and interpreted this drama through his carefully chosen medium (not just photos, but the size of photos, the skill in their artistry, the cooperation with others in the documentary, etc) to reach an audience, to elicit an emotive and intellectual response.

He didn’t need a desk job at a non-profit to do find an issue, get an assignment, or work on solving a critical problem in the world. He came up with this through some trial, tribulation, luck and working to find a meaningful, impacting subject to apply his craft. It seems to be the evolution of a career, some inspiration, mostly perspiration. He worked to master his craft. Then he had an idea, he dug deep, he created, he found the right communication channels, his work was noticed and is making an impact.

His career makes me question if I need to join a larger organization in order to make an impact. How much time do I need in order to find a subject and a medium? I have so many of each, yet so little focus or depth in either. I need to commit. I need to focus, dig deep and develop the ideas. I’ve been floating on various surfaces of subject matter and bouncing around between media. Perhaps I should pick one of each and see how they can mesh?

Even in the work I am doing today, I can start asking: what is the critical message related to this project? what larger themes does this fit into? what is the best medium for investigating the issue and how do i work within that medium to best convey that message.