“Let us leave a splendid legacy for our children…let us turn to them and say, this you inherit: guard it well, for it is far more precious than money…and once destroyed, nature’s beauty cannot be repurchased at any price.” Ansel Adams

One-third of the world’s trees are now endangered. This fact astounds and horrifies me. For five years I traveled around the United States and photographed interesting trees in a portraiture style to capture their beauty and uniqueness. I also collected seeds, bark, and mosses. Then I created a fictional group I named The Society to Preserve Trees (this group is also the basis of my assemblage titled We Were Once Trees).

A toolbox from 1943 holds the laboratory findings of the group. I inserted small, printed images of my photographs in old specimen slides, and placed bark, small branches, seeds, and mosses in petri dishes and lab tubes.

The door of the case shows what remains of the Jeffrey Pine Tree that Ansel Adams photographed in 1940 at Sentinel Dome in Yosemite Valley. It was still majestic in this aged state when I found it.

Media Metal vintage tool box, lab materials, natural materials, photographs

Display Table Top

Dimensions 21½” w x 13¼” h x 12” d