Welcome Home, Vaughn Bell, 2013
Welcome Home, by Seattle-based artist Vaughn Bell, is an ongoing environmental art project designed to deepen visitors’ understanding of how the Schuylkill Center’s forest functions. The installation provides a “home” for plants that are native to Pennsylvania’s early forests, to dramatically illustrate the impact of invasive plants on the forest ecosystem.
Invasives cleared from the site.
After the clearing, before building the structure
Bell and a team of Schuylkill Center staff and volunteers, cleared the area inside the home of all invasive plant species, prepared the ground, re-planted with native plants, and created an enclosure to protect them while they grow. Over time, this project will show us the difference between a native forest and one filled with invasive plants species.
Welcome Home, Vaughn Bell, 2013
Welcome home includes black cherry, eastern redbud, spicebush, palanted in an enclosed gardent hat allows visitors to enter, take a seat and enjoy the forest in a new way. The plants within this house are all species native to the area, evolving here for centuries, providing food and habitat for countless bird and animal species.
Welcome Home, Vaughn Bell, 2013
But human activities like logging, farming, and urbanization have transformed this landscape over time. We have introduced new species that have become invasive, crowding out natives while diminishing the forest’s diversity. Deer overbrowse young seedlings, not allowing the forest to regenerate. Even the climate is changing.
Now, the plants that live in this house require our care and protection to keep them safe while they become established.
Welcome Home, Vaughn Bell, 2013
Visitors are welcome to come in and meet the native plants inside. Over time, you can see how the garden grows!
For more about this project and Vaughn’s work: http://vaughnbellblog.wordpress.com/
About the Artist
Vaughn Bell creates interactive projects and immersive environments that deal with how we relate to our environment. She has exhibited her sculpture, installation, performance, video and public projects internationally. Most recently, Vaughn created a commission for Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art and another for the Edith Russ Site for New Media Art in Oldenburg, Germany. Her work has been featured in Artnews, Afterimage, and Arcade Journal, among others. Vaughn received her MFA from the Studio for Inter-related Media at Massachusetts College of Art in Boston, MA and her undergraduate degree from Brown University. She currently is based in Seattle. To see more, visit http://www.vaughnbell.net/