EBB + FLOW
ABOUT THE INSTALLATION
ARTISTS IN RESIDENCE IN EVERGLADES (AIRIE)
ESTABLISHED 2001, MIAMI, FLORIDA
Ebb + Flow assembles collective stories and sounds from the Everglades wetlands of South Florida. Organized by Artists in Residence in Everglades (AIRIE), whose residency program has cultivated artists’ perspectives on the Everglades National Park since 2001, this project honors the communities and various ecosystems of this region, considering a worldview that expands beyond the human era. Including oral histories from preservation advocates Daniel Tommie (Seminole Tribe of Florida), Dinizulu Gene Tinnie, and Dr. Wallis Tinnie, in an environment conceived by AIRIE alumni Cornelius Tulloch, Germane Barnes, and Christina Petterson, the installation articulates the cultural and environmental heritage of this subtropical landscape, which is under threat from urban development and climate crisis.
Visual description
Entering the Conservatory is unlike any typical “white cube” gallery space we might expect in a museum. In this sun-soaked room we experience wall-to-wall windows topped with a dome of frosted glass, a little like entering an empty greenhouse. The room is rectangular with rounded edges. The window panes are a mint green and molded with very little embellishment. The ornament of the room is instead amplified by the natural splendor of the garden visible just beyond the glass.
The room is empty of furniture except for a window seat that wraps around the perimeter of the room. The built-in bench has been topped with white cushions screenprinted with imagery from the Florida Everglades illustrated by artist Christina Petterson. Petterson uses negative space to create vignettes of the wetlands. A cluster of cypresses, a flock of flamingos, a figure riding a horse submerged in water, figures cutting tall grasses; are a few of the images included to represent the lush and vibrant ecosystem and to tell the stories of the indigenous peoples of the Florida Everglades. The illustrations are naturalistic with a limited color palette of greens, reds, browns, and occasionally blue.
Placed atop the cushions, and strategically spaced around the room, are circular disc shaped speakers with headphones. The wooden discs are wrapped with rattan and are held up, vertically, on a wooden base. The center of the disc is cut out with thin strands of thread stretched vertically across the negative space.
Every item in this room can be touched and explored. Please sit on the cushions and listen to oral histories through the headphones.
Acknowledgements
Artistic direction by Cornelius Tulloch. Sound stations designed by Germane Barnes. Seating designed by Christina Pettersson. Video and audio portraits by Ania Freer. Soundscape installation by Atéha Bailly. Exhibition support and production by Kristina Reinis, Givanete Castillo, and Heike Dempster.
Oral histories from artist and organizer Daniel Tommie (Seminole Tribe of Florida), artist and organizer Dinizulu Gene Tinnie, and cultural organizer Dr. Wallis Tinnie.
Advisory support from the Everglades National Park, Reverend Houston Cypress, Tracey Robertson Carter, Eve Samples, Alan Scott, Jonathan Truppman, Christina Seely, Gavin McKenzie, Dr. Wallis Tinnie, Dinizulu Gene Tinnie, Amanda Williams, Pedro Ramos, and Reginald Chapple.
This installation is made possible with additional support from the AIRIE Board of Trustees and exhibition donors; Tracey Robertson Carter and Christopher Carter, Tyler Emerson-Dorsch and Brook Dorsch, Felecia Hatcher-Pearson and Derick Pearson, Grant and Deborah Smith, Gavin and Christy McKenzie, Tatiana Mouarbes, Open Society Foundation, Tile Allemann and Jonathan Truppman, Riyaad Seecharan, Valerie Grace Ricordi and Jay Flynn, Diana Wege, and Wege Foundation.
