GEER ART 425 EPORTFOLIO
Photo from Montana Fish, Parks, and Wildlife
Bird Note Presents: Grouse
October 10, 2022
This 8 part podcast covers NPR journalist Ashley Ahrean’s experience moving to a farm in rural Washington to cover the Greater Sage-Grouse. Much like wolves, Sage Grouse have become one of the flagship species for controversy between environmentalists, the oil industry, voters, ranchers, and wildlife managers. Sage Grouse were listed as endangered species in 2010 but by that time their range and population was half of what it once was. In order to protect the Sage Grouse restrictions were put in place on both public and private lands which disrupted oil pipelines, fracking, and ranching. Ranching is a dying way of life and ranchers felt that the birds lives were being prioritized over their own. They also felt that they had a right to use their lands however they wanted and that the people creating the regulations looked down on them and didn’t understand their way of life. This created conflict between government agencies like Washington Fish and Game and the ranchers.
Despite the conflict around land use the ranchers generally had positive attitudes towards the birds. They enjoyed hearing and seeing them and viewed them as a symbol of the west and their way of life. Many ranchers feel that they have an obligation to be stewards of their lands that they are ranching to preserve the land so that it is sustained for future generations. Ranchers can move their cattle to different pastures at different times of year and this can actually improve Sage Grouse habitat. There are so many invasive grasses and not enough wild grazers that the prairie is too thick for Sage Grouses to form the lek’s in which they gather during breeding season. Additionally, the thick grasses burn faster and hotter than they would have historically done and this causes the sage brush to be killed in wildfires. By grazing cattle on the land ranchers can keep the invasive grasses at bay which creates better habitat and leaves room for sage brush to grow. Some ranchers take additional actions like putting flagging on their fences. Sage Grouse have notoriously bad eyesight and they can’t see barbed wire fences so they will fly right into them and die. This is problematic because they grouse all gather in the same area for breeding and if there is fencing nearby it can cause dozens of birds deaths. These actions of environmental stewardship that the ranchers are participating in are done not because they are mandated – but because the ranchers also care about the grouse.
The Sage Grouse is an analogous conflict with wolves with the exception that grouse are game birds and wolves are predators. Despite the ranchers preexisting positive perception of the Sage Grouse they still felt alienated and looked down upon by well educated conservationists. Fish and Game worked against the ranchers by trying to force rules apon them when it would have been more effective for them to approach the ranchers with a common goal and educating them on how grouse and cattle can have a mutualistic relationship. Wolf reintroduction is undoubtedly more controversial because unlike the grouse ranchers do not believe that wolves can coexist with cattle. I think that we should reflect on the successful angle of elevating ranchers as environmental stewards instead of looking down on them as a potential way to promote coexistence between wolves and ranchers.
About Pablo Escobar’s Hippos
October 11, 2022
NPR Shortwave – About Pablo Escobar’s Hippos
What ecosystems should we strive to manage for? Are historical ecosystems really the best? These questions are investigated by looking closer into Pablo Escobar's Hippos. After Escobar's assassination, his estate in Doradal Colombia was looted and the exotic animals that could be transported were transferred to sanctuaries. The hippos, however, were set free because they are so large and dangerous to move. It was assumed that they would live out their lives and after 50 years or so die of natural causes. The hippos have not only adapted well to life in the jungles of Columbia but they thrived, and now their population has grown from 4 hippos to 133. Arian Wallach, a ecologist at the University of Technology Sydney, believes that despite the hippos invasive status that they have a place in the ecosystem and shouldn't be killed. Her arguement is that there is no perfect moment in time for an ecosystem and we shouldn't nessisarily be trying to manage for a historical ecosystems. It is natural for ecosystems to change over time and for species to change their ranges.
I personally disagree with Wallach. I think that it is important to preserve native biodiversity above all else, and hippos are changing the ecosystem and pushing other species out. I would like to further investigate ideas of the "ideal ecosystem" as a way to understand contradicting opionions on wolf reintroduction. Many people make the arguement that because wolves were here before that our ecosystem needs them and they should be reintroduced. We can look at Yellowstone and see the positive impacts that wolves had on the landscape. Despite this, our ecosystems are not the same as they were when wolves roamed free in Colorado. We have fewer forests, more cattle, more habitat fragmentation, and more humans in the wilderness. Therefore we are not reindroducing wolves into the ecosystem they lived in prior to their eradication.
Timber Wars
October 11, 2022
Oregon Public Broadcasting created a 7 part series diving into the controversy surrounding the Northern Spotted Owl. In the 1990s conflict was escalating between environmentalists and loggers over the old growth forests in the Pacific Northwest that caught the attention of the entire country. Environmentalists were upset that old growth forest - which takes hundreds of years to develop - were being logged for profit without really understanding the consequences. This resulted in a fued consisting of ecoterrorism, strikes, and ultimately President Clinton's involvment. The result was that loggers felt their way of life had been stolen and blamed the Democratic party and hippies. Before this, loggers tended to vote Democrat and were supportive of preserving natural lands for hunting and fishing. This conflict marked the shift which pitted consumptive forest users against non-consumptive users, and made conservation a political issue instead of a scientific one.
Other Sources
October 12, 2022
I'm currently reading and listening to different media about conservation to better understand the circumstances surrounding wolf reintroduction. In order to understand where people are coming from it is important to look at how they have been treated by environmentalists and what tactics worked and what didn't. The following are other sources that I've read or listened to and will write a response relating the subject to wolf reintroduction.
I would like to find sources on the effectiveness of current scientific communication, the projected impacts of wolf reintroduction, the financial plan surrounding wolf reintroduction and the media that conservative platforms are sharing.
Animal Dialogs - Craig Childs
A Sand County Almanac - Aldo Leopold
Ologies – Carnivore Ecology with Rae Wynn-Grant
Perceptions of carnivores and their importance in ecosystems.
The Daily – Who Do you Want Controlling Your Food?
How ranchers are being overrun by monopolies and why we should care.
Power, Gaze, and Gender
September 21, 2022
There is a default assumption that viewers are male and white in modern film and art - so when people are not from this culture they are identified as other. The male gaze is a perspective of power and it confines everyone else as "other". This historical denial of art created by other groups is a product of blatant sexism and racism, and the aftermath is still impacting people today.
The male gaze sexualizes and removes autonomy from women. Women are often portrayed as being there to be seen but not to see. Women's bodies are objectified and emphasized. This promotes sexism in our culture and also makes it difficult for female directors and artists to be taken seriously. It also an unrealistic beauty standard that is not reflective of how women actually look. Through the ways that women are portrayed from the male gaze they are valued for their physical characteristics and objectified.
The dominant culture recognizes that art created by their own culture is art, but fails to recognize that art created by other cultures is also art. Art is a reflection on the values and culture of the group that creates it, so denying recognition of art to other cultures is the same as denying that their culture has value.
The art world is dominated by white men, and the art that they create is a product of their own cultural and beauty standards. This extends to the world of film where “only 20% of all lead actors and actresses on screen are people of color”. As a society we are impacted by what we see on the media to know what to wear, buy, and look like. Failing to have diversity on these platforms gives the message that people who do not look like the people on screen are “other”.
These effects have real consequences on peoples’ lives. For example, minoritized people have more obsticals because they are having to overcome the stereotypes of otherness in addition to exceling at what they are doing. This can create additional hardship on people academically and when applying to jobs or promotions. According to Perez characteristics such as being overweight that are okay for white men are “deemed less desirable by society” when the person isn’t a white male. Being considered less desirable by society can make it harder to provide for your family if it is giving you a disadvantage when seeking employment.
Arts Based Research
September 12
Arts based research can be qualitative or quantitative. Qualitative research includes things like interviewing people, reading publications, going into the field and observing subjects, and expirementing with materials. Quantitative research can include collecting survey data, incoorperating figures and graphs. Reasearch can be both qualitative and quantitative.
I want to focus on qualitative based research such as interviewing people in the field, reading publications from different groups, and reading papers about management plans for wolf reintroduction. I also want to explore different folklore by region and time of popularity. I suspect that some of the folklore around wolves being dangerous is very old, but remains relevant in communities that raise livestock.
Introduction to Social Research
Jim Brandenberg, White Wolf Testing Water, 2002
September 7, 2022
For my final project I think that I want to take a qualitative approach. I think that my final project is going in the direction of doing some conservation related art based on a single ecosystem. For my quantitative research I will need to read academic papers on the animals in the system that I am interested in to understand their population stability and what is impacting it. Additionally, I will also need to do qualitative research. For example, comparing how we viewed those ecosystems historically versus how we view them today and why.
One idea that I’ve had for my project is doing a drawing based on wolf reintroduction in Colorado. For that research question I would want to interview Kevin Crooks (a CSU professor who is on the Board of Carnivore Management), people in rural Colorado, and people in cities in Colorado. This will allow me to get a perspective from an expert along with get an idea of the cultural beliefs people in different areas have. Additionally, I would want to read historical articles about wolf eradication and the views people had at the time and compare them to contemporary views.
I think that through my research I hope to take a exploration and evaluation approach. My goal is to choose an issue an look deeper into all of the components to understand why they are the way that they are. In wildlife biology there can be good rules and regulations that are ineffective because people don’t believe in them and there is no enforcement. My interest in in capturing the complexity behind all the parts and not in saying what is right and wrong.
Practices of Looking
August 29
Insights:
1. Nothing is truly objective. Even photography which is supposedly an objective lens has a person behind the camera choosing the angle, the lighting, where to crop ect. In this sense even positism which is the belief system which idealizes only that which we know positively through science has a bias. Some art like the painting of a pipe captioned “this is not a pipe” is deliberately bringing attention to the deception (or lack of it). I think that this is important to remember as an artist that you are bringing your own perspectives and biases into your art. If your intention is to be objective it would be helpful to identify your own biases in order to make sure that you are not leaning into them.
2. In order to understand the artists intentions we need to understand the cultural and contextual background surrounding the art. For example, in Butterfly by Yue Minjun if the viewer did not know the Chritian connotations of red horned figures with the devil then the viewer might see the painting as lighthearted. The two figures are laughing with big smiling faces surrounded by butterflies. However, in the context of the Christian connotations with the devil the painting reads as menacing and ominous. I think that we as artists can identify our viewers connotations with certain imagery and try to use that to our advantage. For example, to ranchers wolves symbolize death and are vicious predators, whereas for people in cities wolves are seen as mythical and wise. If you are trying to create art that is pro-wolf reintroduction you would want to make sure that you were avoiding using any imagery that would be seen as threatening.
3. Signs are images, sounds, or words that indicate a meaning that isn’t literally being portrayed. For example, in our culture we associate red with danger or “Stop” and green with money or “Go”. In another culture red might symbolize wealth and green may symbolize sickness. Therefore it is important to think use our culturally prevalent signs to our advantage and make sure that we aren’t giving confusing visual signals.
The image is a young woman running towards the camera smiling. She is looking directly at the camera with confidence. On top of the photo is overlaid text and an image of a box of allergy medication. The text is bold and orange. These components are working together as the signifiers to the sign that Nasacort medicine will make your life better (at according to Nasacort).
What is signified is a young healthy woman. Youth and health are valued in our culture, which is why this signifier is supporting the message of the company. Orange text is often associated with exercise. For example Strava and Orange Theory both utilize the color orange in association with fitness. Blue is also associated with health and healthcare. Therefore the combination of blue and orange on the packaging of the medicine is meant to promote the branding.
Modernity: Spectorship, the Gaze, and Power
August 30th
Modernity began in the 15th century when “Greek intellectuals and artisans … relocated to Wetern Europe, where they conveyed artistic techniques” (Sturken, 89). From there the printing press and movably type presses allowed the communication of new ideas more efficiently than ever before. This ushered in the era of Enlightenment and the fall from power of many European monarchies. The belief in social equality, science, and industrial capitalism became markers for this new era in Europe. Similarly, Modernization was also happening in other countries. In South America and Africa there were fights for decolonization and there were also ideas about “naturalism and realism” (Sturken , 91) in art and poetry.
With the changing culture came a new kind of city. Many people were being drawn to cities for factory work, which in turn demanded living and social accommodations for people. Large apartment complexes were made near factories for the workers to live in, subways were built, and movie theaters and other forms of entertainment were built. The spaces were cramped and the work conditions were poor, but that wasn’t enough to stop the industrial modern era from taking hold.
“Looking” is considered to be “linked to knowing” (103) and the “spectator’s gaze” is a type of looking with more intensity. Through looking at something there is a “power negotiation” happening where the context of the subject being viewed is understood and this informs how the viewer perceives the subject.
