‘Declaration of the Understory’: Artist Tania Willard explores shade as a restorative force
A Q&A with the Sobey Award finalist on her latest installation that reimagines urban space and ecological reciprocity through an Indigenous lens
(Mila Bright Zlatanovic/The Bentway)
By Grace Henkel
Beneath the drone of traffic, midsummer heat and heavy shadows of the Gardiner Expressway, artist Tania Willard‘s recent installation embraces the cityscape, while firmly embedding itself as a call to action for stewardship across urban and natural ecosystems.
Images of the hepatica, or liver leaf flower, trace the concrete columns in the form of vibrant light projections, a symbol evocative of rebirth. A central element in the installation, the motif is inspired by the early-spring flowers that thrive in shaded environments. Declaration of The Understory, part of the Bentway’s exhibition Sun/Shade, is named for the document issued by Secwépemc Kúkpi7 Chiefs and Councillors in response to concerns over ecological recovery following major wildfires near Willard’s home in the British Columbia interior.
The artist of Secwépemc and settler heritage was co-commissioned by The Bentway and the Indigenous Curatorial Collective to design an installation that would “activate the architecture of the highway as an imagined rewilding of public space, proposing a renewing of relations with the lands, urban ecologies, and Indigenous communities.”
What first sparked your interest in this particular project?
I was intrigued by the challenge of the uber urban landscape i.e. below the [Gardiner] Expressway. My life and my work are often focused more within a context of the forest’s edge but I am interested in thinking about urban spaces in terms of how we can be reparative to the harshness of the concrete spaces we have built both metaphorically and literally. In some ways I wondered about gentrification of the spaces and I think that is an ongoing concern but working outdoors or presenting work is also simultaneously low barrier and encourages unexpected audiences so I really liked the context and the previous work of Bentway to activate these spaces. I was inspired by thinking about the resilience and possibilities of re-emerging nature even within these harshest concrete conditions. Inspired by the Secwépemc Declaration of the Understory which reasserted Secwépemc rights to the forest understory after the fires, it was a point of departure for me to look at forest understories and think about them in relation to the project.
What materials did you work with to generate your message? What did the installation process look like?
The work consists of reflective fabric and gobo lights, I wanted the work to be activated in both day and night and to evolve and change through the different stages of the day, the sun etc. I had to special order the fabric and then get it custom printed as the material needed to be perforated to allow wind to move through it. So the materials were very responsive to the site and activated by the context of the site, i.e. the outdoors condition.
As a gardener myself and a lover of plants that thrive in the shade, I found the emphasis on the hepatica motif fascinating. How did you first encounter this plant and how did you envision its image and meaning as part of the exhibit?
I almost can’t remember. At first I was on a tangent about working to direct the sun back under the bents using mirrors and projection from the sun but this idea evolved. Originally the reflectors I was looking at were flower shaped and then I wanted to represent a flower from Ontario to be site-specific. I just started googling a bit about this little hepatica and loved its story — how it was part of this medieval document The Doctrine of Signatures, was a symbol in Japan about patience as it emerges early in the spring through the snow and is this handsome little blue-y purple plant that is a native wildflower. I live amidst a lot of wildflowers and they haven’t entered my references for my work before and this time I wanted to think about one that isn’t present here but is related — it is related to the buttercup which is more prevalent where I am from.
How do you see Declaration of the understory resonate with the broader themes of the Bentway’s “Sun and Shade” exhibition?
I really wanted to emphasize how this native wildflower had such a rich story and yet was this small moment and brief flowering. I wanted to hang on to that moment and make it a large symbol for us to think about our relationships to nature and to think about a plant perspective of the conditions we create; to give this plant relative a voice and design slogans as if written from a plant perspective; and to think about health. The Doctrine of Signatures listed this plant as a medicine for the liver and it was used that way for years — be careful it does have documented toxic properties and The Doctrine of Signatures, while preserving some knowledge, also is full of errors about potent plants. The liver was considered a kind of seat of the soul before the mind became a dominant centre of the body and rational thought. I was interested in the ways we read nature and then activate relations and I wanted to work with these symbols and ideas in a way that also was aware of the dispossession of Indigenous peoples not only form the land, but urban spaces. I thought the idea of the understory and shade plants [and] extending those ideas to think about histories and territories and life forms and strategies of resistance from the perspective of plants fit well with the Bentway’s focus.
“We need ecologies, we need connections and when it is all paved over, we all suffer.”
Considering effects of climate change such as the urban heat island effect or biodiversity loss, how does your land-based artistic practice engage with these pressing issues? What might restoring kinship with the land look like in urban spaces?
I want to point to possibilities and the critical need for intervention and revolution of how we create urban spaces. They just need to be more integrated, they need to give rise to ecologies and we need to think beyond our species in order to repair what a colonial mindset has built. However, I am not an architect or urban planner and I work with the tools I have to inspire and connect. While even then people might miss these ideas and just see some cool lights, for me it is a way of working with ideas, symbols and potentials and carrying forward, in whatever ways I can, the need for change — the need for us to come together to honour the natural world around us and to integrate, to offer when we take, to reciprocate and to respect other forms of life because we need ecologies. We need connections and when it is all paved over, we all suffer.
I want to offer many congratulations on your Sobey Art Award Nomination. What does it mean to you to have been selected as a finalist?
I have never been long-listed for the Sobey, let alone short-listed and I am overwhelmed with how it feels to be recognized amidst other great artists. And to also know there are even greater artists not on this list, awards are strange but at the same time I am so honoured for others to think through and alongside the work. It’s humbling and beautiful and I wish there was space for artists and arts to have even more [chances] to be honoured and given resources in a way that recognizes what the arts and artists do for us — they find ways to dream, stumble, revolt and create meaning and possibility even in the darkest times and contexts.
What do you hope visitors will take away from this installation?
I want people to enact and/or demand change in their lives for healthier ecologies, for Indigenous rights, for support for the arts. I have a tall order — I wish people remembered the magic of the land and what it does for us and that they follow the basic principle of giving back, of reciprocity… That is the declaration of the understory — speak up for each other, for justice, for beauty, for love, for freedom and together with the land and water, we can repair and regrow. The evidence is all around us.
