{"id":381,"date":"2015-09-24T15:49:45","date_gmt":"2015-09-24T15:49:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/guelphoutdoorschool.wordpress.com\/?p=381"},"modified":"2018-07-23T15:43:09","modified_gmt":"2018-07-23T19:43:09","slug":"mark-dion-neucom-vivarium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/experimentalstudio.ca\/outdoorschool\/2015\/09\/24\/mark-dion-neucom-vivarium\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Dion: Neukom Vivarium"},"content":{"rendered":"

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http:\/\/www.pbs.org\/art21\/watch-now\/segment-mark-dion-in-ecology<\/a><\/p>\n

Neukom Vivarium<\/b><\/i>\u00a0is a 2006\u00a0mixed media<\/a>\u00a0installation by American artist\u00a0Mark Dion<\/a>, located at\u00a0Olympic Sculpture Park<\/a>\u00a0in\u00a0Seattle<\/a>,\u00a0Washington<\/a>, United States. The work features a 60-foot (18\u00a0m)\u00a0Western hemlock<\/a>that fell outside of Seattle in 1996, acting as a\u00a0nurse log<\/a>\u00a0within an 80-foot (24\u00a0m)\u00a0greenhouse<\/a>. According to the\u00a0Seattle Art Museum<\/a>, which operates the park, the tree “inhabits an art system” consisting of\u00a0bacteria<\/a>,\u00a0fungi<\/a>,\u00a0insects<\/a>,\u00a0lichen<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0plants<\/a>. The installation supplies\u00a0magnifying glasses<\/a>\u00a0to visitors wanting a closer inspection; they are provided field guides in the form of tiles.<\/p>\n

“I think that one of the important things about this work is that it\u2019s really not an intensely positive, back-to-nature kind of experience. In some ways, this project is an abomination. We\u2019re taking a tree that is an ecosystem\u2014a dead tree, but a living system\u2014and we are re-contextualizing it and taking it to another site. We\u2019re putting it in a sort of Sleeping Beauty coffin, a greenhouse we\u2019re building around it. And we\u2019re pumping it up with a life support system\u2014an incredibly complex system of air, humidity, water, and soil enhancement\u2014to keep it going. All those things are substituting what nature does, emphasizing how, once that\u2019s gone, it\u2019s incredibly difficult, expensive, and technological to approximate that system\u2014to take this tree and to build the next generation of forests on it. So, this piece is in some way perverse. It shows that, despite all of our technology and money, when we destroy a natural system, it\u2019s virtually impossible to get it back. In a sense, we\u2019re building a failure.”[3]<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

From\u00a0https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Neukom_Vivarium<\/p>\n

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Mark Dion is a collector and a shopper. \u201cI am constantly out there buying things, going to flea markets and yard sales and junk stores, and I like to surround myself with things that are inspirational.\u201d Intrigued by natural history and museum procedures, Dion\u2019s collections become part of his installations and public projects that address our ideas and assumptions about nature. \u201cI\u2019m not one of these artists who is spending a lot of time imagining a better ecological future. I\u2019m more the kind of artist who is holding up a mirror to the present.\u201d Viewers follow Dion on a journey during which he brings a \u201cnurse log\u201d\u2014a fallen Hemlock tree which is home to a wide variety of flora and fauna\u2014into the heart of Seattle. (From Art 21 PBS)<\/p>\n

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From\u00a0Travels of William Bartram\u2014Reconsidered, 2010.<\/em><\/p>\n

“Investigating the visual representation of knowledge and the natural sciences, and concerned with the historical methods of representing and organizing the world, Mark Dion employs pseudo-scientific and museological conventions of investigation and display in order to subvert previously held ideas and practices.”<\/p>\n

“Travels of William Bartram\u2014Reconsidered is such a project and represents Dion\u2019s extensive travels throughout the southern United States.\u00a0 In an effort to examine the history and culture of 18th century American naturalist, botanist and explorer William Bartram, Dion followed the approximate course of Bartram\u2019s four-year expedition through eight southern colonies to take notes on the Native Americans and the indigenous flora and fauna. Using the original travel journals, drawings, and maps, Dion initiated his own, modern day, exploratory journey. Often traveling by horseback, canoe, and Jeep, Dion collected, scavenged and acquired numerous artifacts, specimens, and objects of material culture and mailed them back to Bartram’s Garden, the historic 18th century home of William Bartram, and his father John Bartram in Philadelphia.”<\/p>\n

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“Combining the physical beauty of history and science with the detritus of contemporary and past material culture, thousands of objects are beautifully and painstakingly categorized and arranged.\u00a0 Organized in various presentation cases and cabinets, according to form, material and subject, little distinction is given between high or low, or any inherent sense of value.\u00a0\u00a0 Rather, Dion presents the display itself as a kind of democratizing filter, alluding to the wonder and magic of the every day. Found man-made elements include an extensive collection of toy plastic alligators, bottle caps from the decades between Bartram’s and Dion’s respective travels, cocktail umbrellas, pencils and buttons. Other shelves and drawers present organic specimens such as acorns, seashells, and pressed and dried vegetation harvested from the road and stacked high on a tall custom-built cabinet.\u00a0 As with all of Dion’s work, however, it is truly the artist’s selection and presentation that inspires the viewer; offering a fascinating investigation into the inherent contradictions between the artifact and the context in which it is displayed for our consumption.” From\u00a0http:\/\/www.tanyabonakdargallery.com\/exhibitions\/mark-dion_1<\/em><\/p>\n

Mark Dion: Library for Birds:<\/p>\n