By Regina Jestrow, AIRIE fellow

Houston Cypress shows vintage textile to Regina Jestrow

Walking the trails of the Everglades National Park with a bolt of fabric, pins and colored pencils, I wrapped tree trunks along the trails in muslin and rubbed until an impression appeared. Few people pause to look, and even fewer ask me what I was doing. Maybe it was obvious, or maybe they didn’t want to interrupt the soothing sounds of the surrounding hammock. My intention is to show how people have impacted the Everglades–keeping records of lost plants, and working to save and protect existing species.

I was lucky to be there in cool, dry November and attend an airboat excursion with the Love the Everglades Movement. To prepare for the residency I studied maps detailing how South Florida once looked, how it looks today and how conservationists are working to restore the flow of water. Although I’ve lived in Miami for nearly 15 years, I had never been to the Everglades. I took guided tours and learned about the draining of the Everglades, how hammocks were burned, and our obsessive need to build, build, build.

At Long Pine Key Trail, I collected plant material for studio work: fallen pinecones, pine needles, tree bark, dead fern branches, grasses and palm tree fronds. (The result looks kind of like a Rorschach Ink Blot Test). This led me to draping and wrapping: thus distorting the shapes by flattening them out onto cotton sheets. These frottage works will be presented flat, keeping the images distorted, and thus allowing the viewer to interpret them.

Rubbings from long branches and tree trunks will be sewn, stuffed and turned into three-dimensional sculptural “sticks”. The more I created the more surreal and abstract they seemed. The archives were a great source for learning more about the Trees Snail collection from the 1930-50’s. Sadly, collectors would frequently burn the hammocks to prevent competitors from obtaining the unique species. The Interpretive department allowed me to use their snake and gator skins for rubbings, which are seen here at my AIRIELAB open studio .Slough slogging, canoe rides and long walks figured prominently in my residency, as well as an artists talk that I gave at FAU on residencies and transformative learning.