This Is What Nature Looks Like
2021
25′ x 4′ x 3′ ft.
storm damaged local timber, litter, lobster shells, squirrel tail, turkey feathers, birch bark, pine cones
This Is What Nature Looks Like, responds to the shifting ecology of the Charles River. The sculpture mimics the shape of an Atlantic Sturgeon, one of the most ancient surviving fish species that used to populate New England waterways. Now an endangered species, the fish has recently been spotted in the Charles River after decades of absence.
To create this work I appended materials accumulated from the Charles River with examples of post-consumer human-initiated pollution to generate a fantastical vision of a sturgeon.
Present and thriving, albeit in an altered habitat, the imagined sturgeon represents collective hope in the regenerative force of nature and calls us all to enact practices of sustainability and care in our every day habits.