Seeds and Stones
This video performance was created to introduce and question the role of maintenance and responsibility in rewilding urban spaces. In 2017, the St. John’s United church in Kjipuktuk-Halifax was torn down, leaving a site of rubble. Slowly, plants grew between the rocks and started to break down the urban debris into soil. Many birds began to come to the site as water collected on one end in the spring and summer. A wetland in the city began to form. 3 years later, I cut 50% of the grasses with a scythe in an attempt to increase the organic matter in the rocky soil and to maximize the amount of seeds dropped to the ground. What would happen if I were to continue to do this multiple times a year for several years? How can urban landscape maintenance be an opportunity to rewild urban ecosystems without using fossil fuels? The site has been vacant now for 5 years, waiting to be developed into a condominium. How can such ‘vacant’ spaces be transformed into urban oases for wildlife?
Artist Bio
Luke Fair (he/him) is a visual artist currently based in Kjipuktuk-Halifax. His practice is inspired by the absurd, the manufactured, and the grotesque of human interventions in the land. The work manifests primarily as painting, drawing, and walking. He has a BFA from the University of Victoria and an MFA from NSCAD University.