By Lonnie Morris
Each of the four
organizations that make up the DuPage Monarch Project are contributing the
essential resources of science, education, community organizing, and public art
to the shared mission of protecting monarch butterflies and pollinators. All
are important. Science establishes a
knowledge base for implementing and evaluating conservation measures; educators
provide public officials with background information needed for effective
policies; and community organizers bring people together for restoring and
creating habitat. Art helps shape the cultural meanings within which conserving
climate, land, and wildlife makes sense and is valued and pursued.
The
Forest Preserve District of DuPage, a DuPage Monarch
Project partner, adapted to the
pandemic’s impact by shifting its community engagement from in-person programs
to innovative uses of videos and social media. A pollinator-themed art exhibit
scheduled for Mayslake Peabody Estate in May 2020 became a virtual Facebook
show in 2021. Some aspects were lost in the online format,
like the co-mingling of artists and audience at an opening reception, but more
importantly, it preserved the power of art to engage viewers on a critical
environmental issue while other forums were unavailable.
Art is a force
that both reveals and shapes cultural understandings of nature and the
environment. Ellen Corr, Director of Art Partnerships for NRDC,
has been engaging new audiences on environmental issues through visual art for
the past decade. She uses art to tell the story of crises like climate change
and pollinator decline in ways that inspire people to be part of the solution.
Corr’s first
artistic collaboration in 2012 took on the issue of the degradation of the
Chicago River with an installation by Maya Lin, a nationally
recognized designer, sculptor, and environmental activist. Reversing the Flow, Lin’s
topographical map of the Chicago River made entirely of pins, brought attention
to NRDC’s efforts to protect it from the dumping of raw sewage and the
introduction of invasive species like Asian carp.
Two years later,
Corr and artist Jenny Kendler tackled the
issue of declining monarch habitat. Kendler designed a traveling food car with
balloons filled with milkweed seeds for distribution at events in St Louis and
other cities. Passersby were encouraged to take a balloon, popping it where
monarch habitat could take root in a new location. The food cart’s message
inspired Tom Weisner, then mayor
of Aurora, Illinois, and known for his commitment to sustainability and green
initiatives, to reach out to the Illinois Tollway Authority about their mowing
practices. It was the beginning of rethinking the frequency and timing of
mowing along the nearly 300 miles of the
state’s roadways by taking into consideration the impact on monarch butterflies
and pollinators.
Art makes a
difference. Posting Pollinators
in Action: Flowering Journeys on Facebook in the waning months
of the pandemic made a significant contribution to the conversation about the
plight of pollinators during a year when many Forest Preserve programs had been
canceled.
The virtual exhibit
received 26 submissions, many of which zeroed in on the essential relationship
been pollinators and flowers. Close-up, intimate views of bees and butterflies
on flowers showcased tiny creatures playing a starring role in the lives of
plants and the animals and people relying on them for food. The connection
between pollinators and people was implied, as people didn’t appear except in a
portrait by Ann Grill of a beekeeper in full gear. The pollination service
provided by honeybees is primarily a commercial enterprise owned and managed by
people, different from most native species of bees whose life cycles are
naturally intertwined with flowers. People have a complex and complicated
relationship with pollinators, from raising honeybees to diminishing the
availability of habitat for native species and exposing both to diseases and
pesticides. Three works in the exhibit went beyond capturing bees, butterflies,
and moths in their role as pollinators and offered viewers new ways of seeing
and understanding their decline.
Seeking - Sharon Gurley
A hand-cut paper
piece by Sharon Gurley
features a bee, butterfly, and hummingbird, each one positioned on a side of a
white paper triangle set against a black background. The common origin for all
of them from a single sheet of white paper subtly illustrates how several
species share the same habitat and the importance of each occupying a separate
niche. Bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds pollinate different flowers at
different times of the day and year, yet all are necessary for a healthy eco-community,
just as each is necessary to the composition of Seeking.
The choice of
black and white allows the eye to focus on the finely carved minute details of
this piece and the many precise cuts it required. The scale and intricacy of
the design deserve the same close attention as watching busy pollinators at
work, flitting from flower to flower throughout the day and into the night,
collecting grains of pollen and depositing them on barely visible floral
structures.
There is a stark
reality about this piece, as though Gurley is boldly confronting a time when
half of insect species have vanished. She has literally carved
the pollinator out of its habitat, casting the ghostly white halfling into
empty space, leaving its shadow behind. It is a vision of a time when bees and
butterflies have vanished and only memories remain.
Marbled-Green Leuconycta - Emma
Bolton
There is still much for us to discover about the
contribution moths are making to pollination. They work at night, unseen and
unnoticed. Mention moths and thoughts
quickly turn to sweaters with holes, trees stripped of leaves, or critters
showing up in the cupboard invading our food. The many small brown- and
beige-colored species flying about in the dark simply fade into the background,
vanishing from awareness, brought to mind only to take the blame when damage is
discovered.
Moths have a PR problem that Emma Bolton aims to change by
showing us their warm fuzzy side.
Bolton crafted a new image for the marbled-green leuconycta
by sculpting a larger-than-life version from fabric. She reminds viewers that
moths are beautiful through her choice of lichen green and pine-bark browns,
evoking a forest’s peaceful serenity. The rounded softness of the fabric is the
look of a cuddly stuffed animal, transforming the moth from being deplorable to
adorable. Suddenly this marbled-green leuconycta needs a common name like
prairie jasper that rolls off the tongue while conjuring an image of a precious
stone. Curiosity is piqued to learn more about a creature with such a lovely
name.
Little is known about the marbled-green leuconycta beyond
its taste for common dandelions. It’s time to shine some light on the
lesser-known pollinating activities of night-flying moths, such as the
structure of the flowers they visit, whether the species they visit at night
are also visited by daytime pollinators, and how pollen is being transferred. A
full accounting of all current pollinator practices is essential, including the
contributions made by moths, before too many species are lost and a cascade of
extinctions follows.
Bees to
Flowers - Kirk Kerndl
In the
description of his oil painting titled Bees to Flowers, Kirk Kerndl wrote, “I
want people to look at my work and have it captivate them so they…think about
it.” This thoughtful painting does
exactly that.
The first
moments of looking at Kerndl’s painting are spent sorting out its seemingly
disparate elements. There are three bees hovering around a painting of a flower
stuck to a plain, slightly mottled background by two strips of tape. The
composition is austere, a generous space sparsely occupied by a few elements,
leaving the viewer to figure out the story connecting three bees, a paper flower,
and tape.
The bees in
the painting appear frozen, suspended in air without context, with no hint of
where they came from or where they’re going. Habitat is absent, there’s no
nectar, no pollen to sustain them, only a paper flower, an illusion of
sustenance held in place by band-aid colored tape. The painting is a depiction
of what’s missing, of absence and loss.
The
similarity of the tape to band-aids implies a need for healing but also sends a
warning to find a lasting solution for the injury, not a quick temporary fix.
Paper flowers aren’t the solution, and it’s up to us to find a genuine one.
More
habitat, less pesticide, and a stable climate are the solutions to pollinator
decline, but they require people who care. Pollinators in Action: Flowering
Journeys reveals the beauty, diversity, and enormity of what is being lost,
leaving viewers with a medley of feelings: delight, sadness, and hope for a
future where people and pollinators can thrive together.
***
Steve
Ornberg is an amateur photographer located in Naperville, Illinois. He enjoys
nature photography including wildlife, landscape, and macro/closeup subjects.
He spent his professional career traveling around the world as a software
project manager, which provided great opportunities to get back into photography.
He is now retired, which provides more time to enjoy nature photography. Steve
is also the former President of the Mayslake Nature Study and Photography Club,
a position he held for five years, and he is currently the webmaster. The Club
helps photographers to learn more about nature and improve their nature
photography.
Sharon
Gurley is a life-long resident of DuPage County with a strong affinity for
nature. Her preferred mediums are paper and ink, often limiting her palette to
black and white.
Emma Bolton
is an artist based in the Northwest Suburbs of Chicago who enjoys creating in
every way imaginable. She primarily works with fabric, creating both
two-dimensional and sculptural pieces.
Kirk Kerndl
is a realist oil painter and sculptor from Lombard, Illinois. He draws
inspiration from the tranquility of the Midwestern landscape and finds beauty
in ordinary things. Kerndl is drawn to capturing light, stillness, and
isolation in his paintings. He finds the understated calmness of his work
provides a counterbalance to the chaos of everyday life.
