On making sense : some recent investigations in time, metaphor, and ecology

Abstract

A two-part text in which the author ultimately proposes the metaphorical artistic methodology of making sense, and articulates its role in radical ecological projects. The author discusses the body of work produced for her thesis, Rates of Accumulation. With sound as its primary medium, this work turns around the ecological history of the Eastern oyster. Rates of Accumulation is presented as a four-channel sound installation, accompanied by a large-scale drawing and a video, and as an FM broadcast radiating from a temporary radio station inside the Little Red Lighthouse on the Hudson River. With the charismatic figure of the oyster as a touchstone, Rates of Accumulation abstracts, translates and ultimately aims to recast moments in the ecological history of North America's East Coast. The author's methodological framework is used to position her thesis work in relation to radical ecological projects. Making sense is a metaphorical process extrapolated from the familiar literary device, whereby meanings and associations are transferred from one object or context to another. The key operations of transfer, translation and abstraction are elaborated upon through Rates of Accumulation, past work, and select examples from the land art tradition. The author's analysis of metaphorical methodologies allows her to further stake out the role of artmaking in radical ecology, and in particular, its investment in historical projects.