What Lies Between Light Creates Shadows

Conservatory Location

This multi-sensory immersive installation in the Colorado State University Plant Growth Facilities' Conservatory is a simulation of the concept of wilderness. It poses the questions: By separating ourselves from nature, how does the way that we exist in spaces differ depending on our perspective, positionality, and environmental surroundings? What makes an environment “wilderness,” or the absence of?

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In both a literal and figurative sense, our perception of what lies on the other side is communicated based on what lies between.

Transmission towers are power structures and channels created by humans for humans. Spanning across land, past fields, over rivers, up hills. Through farmland, estuaries, highways, backyards, deserts, forests… These systems of electrical communication parallel the natural communication systems of the world, and form a symbiotic relationship that echoes the conversation amongst and between humans and nature.

In fetishizing the idea of an “untouched wilderness,” it is difficult to recognize that even in the most urban spaces, there are wild things dwelling, and even in the most allegedly untouched wilderness spaces, there is a human presence. “We can understand the world better if we don’t treat human beings in isolation from the rest of nature. We are in nature. Our lives are dependent on natural systems and our relationship with other organisms.” -William Cronon

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Materials: Abaca fiber, banana plant fiber*, dumb cane fiber*, alocasia fiber*, metal wire, reclaimed wooden fence posts, metal flashing, cotton rope, lamp parts

*Much of the plant material used in the making of this paper was sourced from the CSU Conservatory. Specifically thanks to the banana tree.