During their residency at PlySpace this August, Beatty and Schofield have installed sustainably themed artworks along the south shore of Prairie Creek Reservoir where the Mid-Indiana Trails (MINT) are located. Visitors to the MINT and Prairie Creek hiking and bicycle trails can see a series of artworks made from natural materials and found objects that investigate human transgressions of natural settings. Signage has been posted along the trails identifying the locations of the pieces. This art installation is a partnership between PlySpace and Mid-Indiana Trails.
The project is located at Prairie Mountain Bike Trailhead. The parking lot is located along East 650 Service Road (E 650 S Rd) near the intersection with South County Road 544 East (S Co Rd 544 E).
Beatty and Schofield will host a self-guided walking tour of the sculptures on Saturday, August 22nd, with a short artist talk and Q&A at 2:00 PM. Participants should meet at the trailhead parking lot. Visitors to the sites and trails must wear masks when unable to socially distance. Paper maps and descriptions of the project will be available at the site and online at plyspace.org/MINT. The work can be found at the eastern end of Prairie Creek Loop 1, in the “Maple Grove”.
PlySpace is an artist-in-residence program of the Muncie Arts and Culture Council which promotes community collaborative projects throughout the city of Muncie. Mid Indiana Trails (MINT) was selected as a partner for this project due to the artists’ desire to work at a site that contemplates human transgressions in a natural setting. David Bradway of MINT writes, “Mid-Indiana Trails is very excited to be able to partner with PlySpace and provide an area for their resident artists to create. Ashley and Jeff have created incredible installations that are expressive while also fitting in well with the natural setting of Prairie Creek Trails.”
About the Installation
The permanent sculptural installations include dozens of sculptural trail markers made from forest materials and discarded plastic items found in the woods. These markers have been strategically placed by the side of the pathways like a series of core samples showing sediment layers beneath the forest floor. A series of stepping stones have also been laid across Prairie Park Creek for visitors to explore. They will be made from a similar mix of natural and manmade items to create a group of sculptural objects intruding upon the stream. As such, they embody a physical expression of human transgressions in the landscape.
In another permanent work, the artists dissected a fallen tree trunk by cutting it into segments that were spread out sequentially where it fell in the woods. This minimalist artwork expresses a singular act of slicing a tree trunk into sections. The installation distills the conversation about deforestation, forest fires, and waste of natural resources to a basic act of aggression.
Other work produced by the artists will be temporary and will be removed after August 22, 2020. In one work, Mycorrhizal Networks, a group of trees have been tied together with paracord creating an artificial canopy overhead. The installation expresses notions about Forest Mycorrhizal Networks, a root-based form of consciousness linking plants in local ecosystems. Plants communicate through the mycorrhizal network in a similar manner to data traveling through color-coded wires in electronic networks.
The artists have also wrapped a series of tree trunks with upcycled plastic items, involving an acre-sized grove of trees. The colorful installation represents the bondage of trees as a metaphor for human bodies and expresses the restriction of natural growth cycles. It questions the sustainability of our globalized culture focused on overproduction and mass consumption.
