Though we traverse pavement, cocoon ourselves in plastic clothing, and may live several stories up in the air, Chicago is a living, breathing place. Just because we’ve paved over so much of the land, doesn’t mean the land isn’t alive.
In this moment of climate catastrophe, what do we want to preserve for future generations and what do we want those future generations to remember? This Land is Alive maps overlooked places, people, and plants in Chicago. So that we can treasure what we have now and to preserve a record for future generations.
Mapping
For This Land is Alive, Chicagoans are taking me to places in the city that are emotionally resonant to them. Once there, I interview them about the place and photograph it. We then collect a soil or botanical sample, which I teach them how to process into scientific and artistic chromatograms.
Visualizing the land’s love and vitality
Despite all the harm most humans have caused, the land still gifts us food and so much more. Visualizing this is a way to remember all the land does for us and that we have responsibilities to return that care and support to the land. This is all the more important in an age where so many feel cutoff from the land and ungrounded as we rush through our days trying to survive.
Soil chromatography is a soil science test primarily used by farmers to assess soil health. It’s also a form of alternative photography, which means photographic images made without a lens. I see soil chromatography as a way to visualize the spirit of the land and its love for us.
To create a soil chromatogram, you extract the compounds and bacteria from a soil or botanical sample, then apply them to paper coated in silver nitrate. Lighter and smaller molecules travel farther along the paper, creating gradients. Silver nitrate is a classic film photography chemical. When you expose the chromatogram to sunlight, the silver nitrate illuminates the compounds and bacteria in the sample, letting you see just how far and in what patterns the molecules travelled along the paper. The more color variation, the larger range of compounds in your sample; the more striations and wavy borders, the more bacteria and bacterial diversity in your sample. With this technique, you can see the components that make up a sample without using a microscope.
Exhibitions
Click here to see where This Land is Alive has been and will be on display in person.
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