Hidden Landscapes
photo @Mario Gallucci
When the water and land slip into each other, a wetland is born. It is a place where the earth is soft beneath your feet and the mud is vibrant. This watery land is sensuous to the touch as it embodies the flux and flow of life. To feel the soft mud as it slips through your fingers is to connect directly with the earth’s memory. Shifting maps tell the stories of changing formations, disappearing lakes and vertical history.
photo @Mario Gallucci
Hidden Landscapes is an installation at the Marine Works in the NW Industrial area of Portland. The art work is composed of vessels formed from various clay bodies that are slowly layered over time. Each abstract vessel is formed from the earth, water and the touch of the human hand – searching for the buried memories.
photo @Horatio Law
photo @Mario Gallucci
drawing and photo by LW
As one looks around the Marine Works Building it is difficult to imagine this as a green wetland filled with waterfowl, sedges and rushes.
To learn more about this vertical history and the peoples and places living beneath the industrial warehouses, Click.
