Guggenheim in N.Y. exhibits “Tree Planting”

A new photograph exhibit at the Guggenheim Museum in New York features a series of photos called “Tree Planting,” reports The New York Times.

The 62-photograph display on a curved wall, highlights many color images from tree plantings that Friends of Trees volunteers are likely familiar with: dirt, tools, trucks, and improved landscapes.

The annual tree planting retreats in Manitoba, Canada, are a rite of passage, according to the story:

One of the show’s most popular inclusions — or so it seemed during my visit — is an installation by the young Canadian-born artist Sarah Anne Johnson. Installed on a curved wall, its 62 color photographs document her experiences at annual tree-planting retreats in Manitoba, a kind of Canadian rite of passage. Some were taken during these trips and capture real people, pickup trucks and landscapes.

Others are photographs of small, constructed dioramas populated by clay dolls, all made by Ms. Johnson, like Mr. Casebere’s scenes. The images of Ms. Johnson’s fabrications give a touchingly awkward, visionary cast to the experiences that seeps over into the photographs of actual events. Visitors kept leaning close to the images to figure out which had been taken with a camera and which had been made for it.

Maybe Friends of Trees—whose plantings have become a rite-of-passage of sorts for Portlanders—should submit a pictorial display to the Guggenheim, too.

–Toshio Suzuki