Deborah Springstead Ford
The Biophilia Hypothesis Comes to the Periodic Table
The Biophilia Hypothesis: suggested by E.O. Wilson in his Pulitzer Prizewinning book, Biophilia: The human bond with other species, discusses the “innate tendency to focus on life and lifelike processes. Wilson makes the case that: “to explore and affiliate with life is a deep and complicated process in mental development…and our existence depends on this propensity, our spirit is woven from it. Hope rises on its currents… And the conclusion that I draw is optimistic: to the degree that we come to understand other organisms, we will place a greater value on them, and on ourselves.” In my exhibit title, The Biophilia Hypothesis suggests that humans seek a bond with other species, may even require it or benefit from it for a healthy existence, and binds us to all other living things. While, The Periodic Table is a reference to my last body of work CHON (Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen and Nitrogen), a look at four elements at the core of life’s sustaining cycles, events and processes. In that work there was a primary focus on the significance of water in reclamation and restoration of the earth from the battery at Fort Worden to Biosphere2.
These new images evolved directly from CHON, still finding their source within water, but attending to the minerals and microorganisms that live and grow within these waters. The new photographs created in the last two years in and around Yellowstone National Park, explore the living colors that result from minerals, bacteria and archae found in geothermal features, such as geyers, fumaroles and hot springs. The intense colors from these geyser basins result from the interaction of water, minerals and microorganisms, highly dependent upon ph, temperature and other elements such as hydrogen, iron or sulfur. Microbial mats are formed in and around the geothermal features and consist of thermophiles (heat loving) and extremophiles (intense heat and/or acid loving) including bacteria, archae and some eukaryotes. Research has revealed that these microorganisms are some of the world’s oldest life forms and that the sulfuric pools where they exist may resemble early Earth. And while these microbes thrive in extreme environments such as Yellowstone, they may hold answers to life forms to be found in other extreme habitats on nearby planets and moons.
My photographs are not microscopic by nature. The focus of this project is on the larger view, the range of colors produced as a result of the presence of these living organisms. Because my photographs only abstractly (through color) represent the variety of microbes and minerals found within the park, I have asked my son Jordan Ford (glass artist/geologist and Melting Point hot shop manager) to collaborate with me on creating more accurate visual representations of the actual microorganisms (Chlorobium, Oscillatoria, Zygogonium, and Calothrix) that more closely illustrate the visual characteristics of microbes. Using borosilicate (glass) and photo etching techniques, Jordan will be co-creating 5-6 small wall pieces that will enhance the perceptual/conceptual understanding of the exhibit. Because blown glass is made up of a silica compound, similar to what is found sub-surface in and around these geothermal areas creating a natural plumbing system, I thought it was particularly appropriate to have works made of these materials.
Click here for video of gallery talk at the Natural History Institute.
This project generously supported in part with funds from the
Montana Arts Council, the State of Montana and the National Endowment for the Arts. |
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CHON: Selections from A Nearly Fatal Illusion
For the past eight years I have been photographing in and around the Powder River Basin in north central Wyoming (see Cartography and the Cultural Terrain), a stunning landscape where energy exploration is expanding exponentially. Wyoming is “ground zero” for oil, gas and coal exploration. Mining, drilling, hydraulic fracturing and transportation of energy resources takes a huge toll on the natural environment, destroying habitat for a great number of species (from sage grouse to pronghorn, trout to humans), leaving unsightly scars and detritus while contaminating ground water reserves. But currently, we are a society dependent upon fossil fuels. If our western habitats are to survive massive industrial development of energy resources, warming temperatures, pollution, and livestock grazing then we must begin to embrace our responsibilities.
A Nearly Fatal Illusion is a direct reference to Barry Commoner’s ideas from The Closing Circle regarding contemporary society’s alleged independence from nature. This lack of recognition that we are a part of nature, not separate from it is a core problem to our understanding the sustainability of our practices and the repercussions of our actions on these life forms and processes. It seems imperative that we begin to recognize our roles in the solutions as well as in the problems. See installation views here and below...
CHON: Carbon-Hydrogen-Oxygen-Nitrogen
These four elements; are the core of life’s sustaining cycles, events and processes including respiration, photosynthesis, decomposition, oxidation and precipitation. In this new body of photographs I attempt to explore the intersection of art, science and nature, chaos and climate, while trying to understand the tenuous equilibrium that these core elements play within the ecosystem, for reclamation and restoration of a planet in peril. This selection of photographs focus on a visual investigation of these elements within life's soup amidst the arid landscapes west of the 100th meridian contrasted alongside images of natural reclamation occurring in an abandoned battery at Fort Worden, Washington.
Biosphere 2
I was awarded an opportunity to be artist in residence at Biosphere 2. My time there allowed me to shift my focus from one of concern, anger and despair about our changing environment to that of hope and possibility. My own visual research led me to scrape the surface of understanding the interconnectedness and complexity of life’s biological processes. B2 is a place where attention to biological processes is the order of the day and where one sees evidence of scientists, students and artists turning concern into knowledge, and knowledge into solutions for change.
The Battery at Fort Worden
Fort Worden, on the Olympic Peninsula, was first established in the late 1890’s to defend Puget Sound and the surrounding areas. The Fort closed in 1953 and the battery, a great fortress constructed of steel and cement, apparently impervious to the most aggressive of attacks is no longer maintained. But today this battery is a “living laboratory” of nature’s work in reclamation. In The World Without Us, author Alan Weisman eloquently imagined the possibilities for the planet as it begins a self-healing process when humans are no longer present. I found the battery at Fort Worden a small example of these elements and processes at work unobstructed by human intervention.
I am not a scientist. I am a photographer in awe of the natural world, its processes and phenomena found within my sphere of experience. It is within this sphere of collaboration with biology, physics, and beyond, dovetailing with other ways of knowing (in my case, photography), that we are able to make sense of the world in which we live.
I am not a scientist. I am a photographer in awe of the natural world, its processes and phenomena found within my sphere of experience. It is within this sphere of collaboration with biology, physics, and beyond, dovetailing with other ways of knowing (in my case, photography), that we are able to make sense of the world in which we live.
Cartography and the Cultural Terrain
In this body of work, I use photographic (film-based) images of landscapes and geological forms symbolic to me as an avenue to examine the historic impetus for westward expansion, colonialism and the search for natural resources. I attempt to create visual narratives that gain their ambiguity from the photographic techniques employed as well as the juxtaposition of the visual data from maps, artifacts and other text. This work has been an ongoing dialogue into the contradictory concepts surrounding landscape and visual representations of geography, and how these relate to cultural memory, identity and ecological issues. I am also interested in the ways that photographs have contributed to our understanding of this thing we call “place”.
I use these images in general to explore a range of ideas surrounding historic and contemporary westward expansion, but in particular as an examination of environmental factors related to mining and land use practices. I am increasingly surprised by the motivations, sacrifices and belief systems behind colonialism that laid the groundwork of the American Dream and now plague us in our consumer based society.
In addition to the socio-cultural questions about the westward movement, I began to pay more attention to how this expansion affected land use practices, species habitat, ecological sustainability and other conflicting cultural and environmental values inherent within notions of the American West. These issues gave rise to the impetus to explore the balance within the relationship between the benevolent and malignant aspects of our intersection in nature and culture, while ultimately exploring the crossroads of science and art.
I use these images in general to explore a range of ideas surrounding historic and contemporary westward expansion, but in particular as an examination of environmental factors related to mining and land use practices. I am increasingly surprised by the motivations, sacrifices and belief systems behind colonialism that laid the groundwork of the American Dream and now plague us in our consumer based society.
In addition to the socio-cultural questions about the westward movement, I began to pay more attention to how this expansion affected land use practices, species habitat, ecological sustainability and other conflicting cultural and environmental values inherent within notions of the American West. These issues gave rise to the impetus to explore the balance within the relationship between the benevolent and malignant aspects of our intersection in nature and culture, while ultimately exploring the crossroads of science and art.
High Desert Grasslands
Public Views/Personal Fictions
All images © Deborah Ford.