RisingEMOTIONS is a collaborative art project that pilots the integration of digital technologies and public art to create a highly local art piece that visualizes the public’s emotion related to flooding due to sea level rise. The artwork made use of a custom easily accessible online survey to gather information about how residents of East Boston feel about the effects of sea level rise in their neighborhood. Their responses and emotions were visualized and transformed into an art installation that uses bands of color to represent the future levels of flooding against the backdrop of the East Boston Branch of the Boston Public Library. Participants of the online survey were encouraged to connect to ongoing governmental and grassroot efforts around resilience. The project seeks to pilot a new hybrid model that combines art and social technologies for data collection and visualization by which to promote equitable resilience and inclusive planning through increased public engagement.

The installation consists of bands of color that are set on steel frames on the grassy area in front of the East Boston Branch of the Boston Public Library. The bands then travel across the patio and upward against the windows in the front of building. The height of the frames and the lines on the building represent the height for the projected 1% annual chance flood for this specific location in 2070 (about 3.7 ft). This data was provided by the University of Massachusetts Boston Sustainable Solutions Lab.

The project asked residents how they feel about how East Boston will be significantly affected by flooding due to climate change. Their answers were color coded into five emotions: concerned, optimistic, angry, sad, and other. Concerned is expressed in teal, optimistic as yellow, angry as red, sad as dark blue, and other as green. Over 150 residents participated in the online survey during a two-week period. Their responses show that the majority feel concerned (51%), followed by optimistic (17%), sad (14%), angry (9%) and “other” (9%). Some excerpts from the responses left by participants were transcribed by hand onto the ribbons by local students and residents.

Some sample responses include:

Climate change needs serious attention. But I believe programs like these could help in making a change.

I hope we can slow it down.

It makes me worried since I've never moved in my life, and don't know where I am going to end up in the future. Having lived here my whole life, it would be sad if something bad happened.

It’s easy to think that someone else will solve the problem, but everyone should step forward to solve this problem.

Es preocupante ver como el clima esta cambiando y no se ve que se esta haciendo al respecto!

I am angry that people are living in denial of this crisis.

I am afraid that my home will flood, and I'll lose my life savings. I'm afraid the city will care less because we are not an affluent community.

It's just a hoax.

I want to know what the government is doing and what steps they are taking to address this.

The project was led by Carolina Aragón, in collaboration with Narges Mahyar, assistant professor in the College of Information and Computer Sciences, and their team of UMass Amherst students. The project was funded by a Barr Foundation grant to the Friends of the Mary Ellen Welch Greenway and developed in close collaboration with the Boston Society of Landscape Architects, Excel Academy, the East Boston Branch of the Boston Public Library and East Boston residents. The project was coordinated to expand the outreach of local planning efforts by the City of Boston Planning & Development Agency, the City of Boston Environment Department, and local grassroots organizations: Harborkeepers and GreenRoots.

STUDENT TEAM:

Mahmood Jasim, Claudia Lafontaine, Amanda Welch, Joyia Smikle, Ted Duffy, Nigel Cummings, Brooklyn Feng, Lyla Fitch, Zoe Kearney, Philip Chen, Costanza Fusco & Christopher Liu.

WITH SUPPORT FROM:

Friends of the Mary Ellen Welch Greenway

East Boston Branch of the Boston Public Library

Boston Society of Landscape Architects

Boston Planning & Development Agency

City of Boston Environment Department

Boston Art Commission

Excel Academy, Harborkeepers, GreenRoots

UMass Boston Sustainable Solutions Lab

University of Massachusetts Amherst: Department of Landscape Architecture and Regional Planning + College of Information and Computer Sciences

SPECIAL THANKS:

Margaret Kelly, Gretchen Rabinkin, Michelle Moon,
Chris Watson, Paul Kirshen, Maria de la Luz Lobos, Robert Gilmore, Neenah Estrella-Luna, Jane Buxton, Amy Beth Harrison, Matt Conti & Christopher Rucinski.

Photos by Matt Conti

High Tide at the World Bank was part of The Art of Resilience Exhibit at the World Bank. This exhibit aimed to show contemporary artists are engaging with the themes of disaster and climate change in their work worldwide.

The installation was selected from a global call which yielded nearly 450 entries from 139 artists representing 53 countries. A jury consisting of curators, cultural institution directors, and resilience project managers from a range of organizations—the Smithsonian’s Renwick Gallery, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the Climate Museum, the World Bank Group Art Program, and the GFDRR Labs—evaluated all the pieces. Artists were judged on their creativity, conceptual engagement with the theme of resilience, artistic skill, and craftsmanship. Ultimately, 21 pieces from 15 artists were selected for the exhibition.

For the Art of Resilience Exhibit, High Tide visualizes the extreme, intermediate high, and intermediate low scenarios for sea level rise in Washington DC for 2050 and 2060 as projected by NOAA.

Photos by Jan Dams/World Bank.

FutureWATERS | AGUASfuturas was a hand-made installation that visualized the projected 1% annual chance flood expected on the East Boston Greenway in 2030 and 2070 due to sea level rise.

Inspired by the water’s surface, the installation used motion sensors to activate solar-powered lighting to evoke the sense of displacing water as one moved through the greenway. Additionally, spheres with thermochromic pigments were designed to change color, from blue to pink or blue to purple, if temperatures reached the projected highs for November of 2030 or 2070.

This art installation is sponsored by the FRIENDS OF THE EAST BOSTON GREENWAY in partnership with the Boston Society of Landscape Architects & the Mystic River Watershed Association as part of the Barr Foundation Waterfront Initiative.

Installation Design Team: Kathleen O’Connor, Jeremy Paradie, Gwendolyn Stoll, Joyia Smikle, Gilmore Landscape Architecture

Special thanks:

Boston Parks and Recreation Department,

UMass Amherst, Department of Landscape Architecture & Regional Planning

UMass Boston, Sustainable Solutions Lab

UMass Boston, School for the Environment

Woods Hole Group

BSC Group

Councilor Lydia Edwards

UMass Amherst students

East Boston residents

High Tide is an abstracted marsh landscape that seeks to bring attention to the shifting boundary between land and water along Boston’s shoreline. Inspired by a marsh during high tide when the grasses are flooded by water, the installation speaks of the city’s changing shoreline. This shifting boundary occurs at multiple scales: through daily tidal fluctuations, historic man-made land reclamation, and potential future flooding due to sea level rise. 

Commissioned by:

The Rose Kennedy Greenway Conservancy, Boston, MA

Flocks was an ephemeral physical intervention into the urban landscape of Cambridge Street. This art installation challenged the concept of public art as permanent and robust by using lightweight materials to create a dynamic composition of reflective birds along a one-mile segment of Cambridge Street in Cambridge, MA.

Inspired by both bird and human migrations, the project sought to create a memorable experience that celebrates the dream that fuels long and difficult migrations and the coming together of groups to create a new life.

Reflective, hand-made, plastic film birds are suspended from high-tech non-metallic rope. This lightweight super-structure allows the birds to “fly”, both individually and collectively, as the flock is activated by the interaction of the individual birds in response to changing environmental conditions of light and wind. The reflective nature of each bird allows it to maintain its own identity within the flock. 

Flocks was the winner of an Ideas Competition for a Public Art Commission by the Cambridge Arts Council. 

To learn more, visit: www.cambridgeflocks.com

Commissioned by:

Cambridge Arts Council & the City of Cambridge.

Additional funding: Boston Foundation for Architecture 

Special thanks:

Boston Architectural College,

Cambridge Electrical Department,

Cambridge Public Schools and Public Library.

The Photoluminescent Labyrinth was a collaborative project with the College of Nursing at UMass Amherst. This art installation combined material exploration with the healing properties of labyrinth walking practices. The labyrinth used photoluminescent materials (commonly knownd as glow-in-the dark) that charge during the day and slowly release light at night; and a dichroic film, which created an interactive colorful display during the day.

This project was developed with Christopher Rucinski, Landscape Architecture student at UMass Amherst (BSLA 2016).

Special thanks to Donna Zucker, College of Nursing, UMass Amherst.

Few things in nature are as ephemeral and universal as clouds. The observation of clouds allows our perception of the natural environment and our imagination to merge into a dance that defies capturing and is not static.

Instead of recreating formal qualities of shape and form, Portland Cloud creates a cloud based on the principles of physics using them as a starting point to create a piece that speaks about Portland’s atmospheric conditions while engaging the public in a playful manner.

Commissioned by:

Regional Arts & Culture Council,  Portland, Oregon

Located on Governor’s Island, NY, Flutter created a space in which the boundary of land and water disappeared, allowing the public to walk through a field of ripples that are activated by the wind and sunlight.

Seen from land and water, with its ever-changing variety of light and color expressed as a floating mass of ripples, the piece is experienced as an extension of the New York Bay into Governor’s Island.

Figment Art Festival, Governor's Island, NY. 2009

Rose F. Kennedy Greenway, Boston, MA. 2010

Weightless, transparent and believed to be a medium for the transmission of light, ether was believed to be the element occupying the upper regions of space or the heavens.

As an art installation, Ether acts as a contemplative space where the participant is transported to an alternate reality – emotional and perceptual, as he or she interacts visually with this composition of translucent luminous bodies. This imaginary landscape – evoking the qualities of air, sky and light, seeks to induce the free play of creative imagination in its participants.

Ether is an installation of translucent luminous clusters, which form a screen suspended by poles at 20 ft. intervals reaching a height of 17 ft. above the ground. Multiple pieces of clear bio-degradable film are folded and joined to create three-dimensional clusters reminiscent of a conglomeration of bubbles.

During the daytime, the clear film reflect and refract light, re-interpreting the street and sky views while at night the clusters become illuminated through the use of solar powered LED lighting activated by a sensor at dusk.

Ether was located near Kendall Square  in Cambridge, MA. 

Commissioned by:

ConstellationCenter, Cambridge,MA

Installation team:

Rob Gilmore, Devin Harper, Ryan Paul.

Ripples  was a temporary installation located on the lawn of Christopher Columbus Park in Boston, MA. As its name indicates, the installation was inspired by the dynamic light reflection created by the ripples of water on this waterfront site.

Two serpentine-like mounds were created using a pvc pipe staked to the ground. Thousands of iridescent film tabs were then woven through the frames, creating a dynamic surface of color and light.

Commissioned by the Boston Art Commission- 2012

Luminescence, the emission of light without the generation of heat is one of the most efficient ways of creating light. 

The absorption of natural daylight, then the slow release throughout the night makes photoluminescent materials an ideal material for lighting in environments that have low to non-existent ambient light. 

These studies show the incorporation of photoluminescent pigments into several mediums to create prototypes for larger scale use. 

Shallow Waters  was a temporary art installation located on Chelsea Square in Chelsea, MA. Using tomato stakes and reflective mylar, the installation created an artificial marsh in one of Chelsea's most active public spaces. The installation brought attention to the historic importance and current environmental challenges of this tidal waterfront landscape. 

Chelsea was the site of the battle of Chelsea Creek, the  first naval battle of the American Revolution won by the colonists because of their knowledge of the shallow waters and tides. Currently dominated by port industry, this landscape has been highly manipulated, offering limited physical and perceptual access.  

Shallow Waters was created by college students from the Boston Architectural College, and local youth from the East Boston Mario Umana Middle School,  ROCA and EC3 (Environmental Chelsea Creek Crew), who developed bilingual signage and audio tours. 

Co-authored with Gretchen Schneider Rabinkin

Winner of Fund for the Arts Grant - New England Foundation for the Arts

Generously supported by the Chelsea Collaborative, the Chelsea Artists' Collaborative, the City of Chelsea, and ROCA.

With many thanks to Adriane Cody, Cristi Johnson and Eric Smoczynski.

As the 2014 Artist-in-Residence for the National Park Service’s New England National Scenic Trail (NET), I developed and exhibited a community-based art project in collaboration with the Holyoke Community College’s CHOICES after school program in Holyoke and Smith College students. The students named the project Parks to People.

The goal of this work was to create a greater connection to the local landscape, especially for youth and recent immigrant groups. Through field trips to Mt. Tom State Reservation and visits to the Holyoke Public Library History Room, students developed art projects, including a PVTA bus sign,  that called attention to the New England Trail. 

As an educator, I strongly believe in the value of public art as a tool for teaching about the built environment. Flocks involved over 500 students ranging from kindergarten to graduate level college students from the Boston Architectural College.  

The educational activities developed by the Flocks team focused on the subject of human migration, the understanding and making of public art, and its effect on the built environment. 

The Flocks educational outreach involved two schools closest to Cambridge Street: King Open School (K-8), and the 9th grade class of the Cambridge Rindge and Latin School.

Special thanks to Cambridge Public School art teachers Kelley Mowers and Elizabeth Menges for working with us in their classrooms;  and Len Charney, Head of Practice at the Boston Architectural College for supporting this effort.

Outreach coordinators: Cristi Johnson & Joshua Ayares

Funded in part by a grant from  the Boston Foundation for Architecture.