About the Exhibition
FOREST⇌FIRE is an inter-disciplinary, multi-sensory installation connecting art, the humanities and science. On display at the Truckee Community Recreation Center from December 10, 2021 through September, 2022, it flows thematically through past, present and future, utilizing painting, textiles, beadwork, sculpture, and more, to tell the story of the forest ecology and its relationship with fire. Of how indigenous people, using low intensity fire, created and maintained the West’s pre-European, old growth forest for thousands of years, of why our forests are currently in ecological collapse and what can be done immediately to prevent the loss of it.
Through the story and artwork of 18 California writers and artists, the exhibition:
Shares a science-based solution to catastrophic fire.
Addresses the paradox that some trees need to be removed to save the Forest.
Explains why fire needs to become our partner in returning the Forest to resiliency.
Provides a vision of what a healthy future forest actually looks like.
Offers an economically sustainable, hopeful future for the Forest.
Aims to activate a transformative cultural understanding that we learn to live as a part of Nature, rather than apart from Nature in facing Climate Change
Bringing our forests back into equilibrium (⇌) with fire via small tree and slash reduction combined with traditional low intensity burns, will regenerate healthy, fire-resistant, large tree forests of pristine beauty and great utility, personally affecting each and every Californian. Healthy, large tree forests purify our water and the air that we breathe, slow the effects of global warming via carbon sequestration, accelerate biodiversity by anchoring biomes, and provide an endless and sustainable source of small-tree timber products and the jobs that result from maintaining a healthy forest ecosystem into the future.