In June 2024, Blue Lab—which I co-founded with Allison Carruth and where I'm Creative Director—staged the inaugural installation of our Popup Story Patch at Morris Arboretum & Gardens in Philadelphia. The project was supported by a grant from the Penn Program in Environmental Humanities under its multi-year Ecotopian Toolkit project.
Emphasizing imagination, memory, speculation and active engagement, the Popup Story Patch invited visitors to participate in conversations, experiences and creative projects that might reframe how they think about and engage with the more-than-human world.
The Popup Story Patch comprised four "engagement stations" that asked visitors to consider some of the animals, plants and places that have captivated their imaginations. These could be multispecies family members, lively presences in yards or neighborhoods, and reminders of ecological loss or places they've called home.
I led and art directed the project, which was co-created with Allison Carruth, Jayme Collins, Nate Otjen and Asela Perez-Ortiz. I also created the short film about the project below.
