WHEN THE LANDSCAPE
RECOGNIZABLE TODAY
WAS SHAPED

ABOUT

An exhibition about past, present, & future ecologies in the Illinois River Valley.
Featuring the work of: Ryan Griffis, Emmy Lingscheit, Damon Locks, Josh Rios, Stephen Signa-Avilés

When the Landscape Recognizable Today Was Shaped is a film and exhibition about the dynamics of extractive land-use policies and efforts at conservation and restoration of wetland ecologies in the Illinois River Valley. The project brings together documentary narrative, creative non-fiction, speculative science fiction, and forms of image/object making. It presents a world that is simultaneously real and speculative, asking questions about possible futures to understand the present differently. A central question is, “How can restoration and conservation practices be understood within a regional ecology that has been so completely transformed by regimes of settler-colonialism and industrial extraction?”

The form of the project is the result of improvisational exercises between artist Ryan Griffis and four other artists, who were given simple conceptual and open-ended prompts. One outcome of these improvisations is a 35-minute experimental documentary film by Ryan Griffis that is varyingly interrupted by the works of the other artists: The Recollector, a multi-part narrative sculpture by Stephen Signa-Avilés, is a time traveling archivist that communicates with underground communities of plant roots and microbes. Emmy Lingscheit's lithograph Confluence maps the time and space of the Illinois River Valley in non-linear flows. Return of the Waters, a sonic sculpture and performance by Josh Rios, celebrates the future end of the war against water (and the life it sustains) waged by colonial logics of violence and domination. Damon Locks’ Erosion (Hope Is The Soil) is a musical call to action, guiding us towards better relations with our fellow human and other-than-human neighbors.

This exhibition and program were made possible by:
The Campus Research Board and the Humanities Research Institute at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
The Puffin Foundation, Ltd