Future Gardens as Eco-Cultural Collaborations

The Harrisons describe their first Future Garden, the Garden of Hot Winds and Warm Rains (1995), proposed for a museum in Bonn as “...a multi-layered story told with artifacts, media events, texts, and living materials, which all together engage the probable Greenhouse future directly. It is a work of art that will be garden, prediction, and promenade, a voyage of sorts... The task we set for this work is the exploration of eco-cultural collaborations that would make for a future no longer based on extraction. ... these gardens look at what a future could be like if conscious, mutually beneficial collaborations between human cultures (civilizations in all their complexities) and the cultures of nature (the life webs complicating and diversifying up to the space and energy available) became a norm.”

What does this multi-layered story look and feel like in the present?

Join us for a panel discussion with people who have collaborated with the Harrisons on Future Gardens including current on the ground proposals. The panel is moderated by Anne Douglas and Chris Fremantle. Featured speakers include:

• Josh Harrison, son of Helen and Newton and currently director of the Center for the Study of the Force Majeure at UC Santa Cruz.

• Gabriel Harrison, son of Helen and Newton and Associate Director and Curator of Galleries and Exhibitions, at Stanford University, Department of Art & Art History.

• Laura and Benny Filmore, Elders of the Washoe Tribe who worked with Helen and Newton Harrison on the Future Garden at Sagehen and continue to advise that project.

Joshua Harrison is a filmmaker, environmentalist and educator. After a lifetime of connection to their process, principles, and outcomes, he began working directly with his parents Helen and Newton Harrison in 2012 to support strategy, large projects and overall development for the Center for the Study of the Force Majeure at UC Santa Cruz. He became Director following the recent death of Newton Harrison in 2022. Josh has been engaged in the intersection of art and ecology since participating in middle school demonstrations on the first Earth Day in 1970. His work centers around bringing together artists, scientists, engineers, planners and visionaries to design regenerative systems and policies that address issues raised by global temperature rise at the scale that they present.

Gabriel Harrison is Associate Director and Curator of Galleries and Exhibitions, at Stanford University, Department of Art & Art History. His work sits at the intersection between the curatorial process, installation art, and exhibition design. Trained as an architect, Gabriel has designed exhibitions for major museums in the U.S. and in Europe, as well as being a founding member of the Harrison Studio, curating, teaching design, and working with city agencies to integrate art into public spaces. Gabriel holds both a B.A. Arch. and an M.Arch. from U.C. Berkeley and attended the Royal Danish Academy of Art and Architecture in Copenhagen, where he lived and worked for a decade, including creating exhibitions for the Danish National Museum and curating the Danish National Pavilion for a previous Venice Architecture Biennale.

Laura Fillmore is an artist and community organizer whose current work includes collaborating with artists and firefighters around reintroducing cultural fire on the landscape with the BOD for the Center for the Force Majeure, establishing a community makerspace, and working on a community-led futurist curriculum as part of her focus on directing the Woodfords Indian Education Center, a California Office of Education wrap-around program offering an integrated program of indigenous arts and culture, rigorous academic instruction, recreation, and anti-racist, community-based social justice.

Benny Fillmore served on the founding board of directors for Wà:šiw Wagayay Mangal “House Where Wà:šiw is Spoken,” a language immersion school run by Wà:šiw “itlu Gawgayay,” a non-profit founded by the Wàši:šiw “Washoe People from Here.” He founded Demlu ‘uli Mongil, on the Dresslerville Ranch, and stewards it still. He was recently appointed to the Washoe Cultural Resources Advisory Board (WCRAC); a board of culturally competent Elders who make decisions about what the Washoe Tribe will honor (or avoid) in regards to the work of educators, cultural workers and the Tribal Historic Preservation Officer (THPO). A ceremonial leader, Benny is often asked for his help by others when healing is needed. A traditional singer, he is currently working on bringing back Wà:šiw songs and teaching his sons and grandchildren for the future, and contributing to the work of The Center for the Force Majeure in forests and future gardens on his homelands.

Moderators:

Anne Douglas is Professor Emerita, Gray’s School of Art, Robert Gordon University, Scotland, exploring the changing place of the artist in public life. This research has increasingly focused on art and the environmental crisis from a practice-led research perspective. She co-produced the Harrisons’ work “On the Deep Wealth of this Nation, Scotland” (2017) in collaboration with Newton Harrison and the Centre for the Study of the Force Majeure, University of California Santa Cruz.

Chris Fremantle is a researcher and producer of award-winning projects. He was producer on the Harrisons’ project “Greenhouse Britain: Losing Ground, Gaining Wisdom.” He is a longstanding member of the international ecoart network and co-editor of “Ecoart in Action,” a collection of activities, case studies and provocations drawn from the network. He lectures at Gray’s School of Art, Robert Gordon University, Scotland.

Presented in conjunction with the Mandeville Art Gallery at UC San Diego's PST ART: Art & Science Collide exhibition Helen and Newton Harrison: California Work.