#ghostforest

“Just seeing the shadows that the trees are going to make become such a part of the piece.” -Maya Lin, Ghost Forest.

“But “Ghost Forest,” like Lin’s Vietnam Veterans Memorial, is also a work of decolonization — actively seeking out what has been lost in the ravages of colonialism and acknowledging the trauma that remains in order to heal and find pathways forward.” Vina Orden, Hyperallergic.

 1. What does this installation evoke for you? Does it inspire you? What emotions does this piece elicit?

Maya Lin’s “Ghost Forest” in Madison Square Park, elicits grief. It causes the audience to feel like they are standing in a graveyard, mourning. But we are not just mourning the earth, for a lot of young people we are mourning our futures. Lin’s exhibit shows us what our world could look like if big corporations continue to turn a blind eye to climate change. We could be entering the 6th Mass Extinction of Earth.

However, Lin’s purpose for this piece was not just to riddle the audience with guilt, and hopelessness, but uses this installation to call the community together. Throughout the running of the exhibit, Lin and Madison Square Park Conservancy have orchestrated a series of public programs aimed at nature-based solutions to climate change. For example, whatismissing.org suggests that we should eat less meat and support sustainable agriculture, fisheries, forestry, and buy environmentally friendly products. 

2. What do you think was the artist's intention in installing this piece in the center of a Manhattan park?

When you live in a city you tend to take nature for granted. Yes we have parks, and there’s little plots of grass that we let our dogs do their business on our way to get morning coffee but we can’t exactly do outdoor activities like stargaze or camp in our own backyards. We rely heavily on technology, gas powered transportation, and consumerism here. I believe Lin’s intention when installing this piece in the center of a Manhattan Park was to wake up New Yorkers, and call them out for sleepwalking through this global crisis. Sometimes it’s a little too easy for us to ignore issues if we can’t see it happening in front of us. That’s why Maya Lin installed 40 ft, dead trees in one of Manhattan’s most beloved parks.

3. What is your earliest memory of an encounter with a bird song?

In NYC, we don’t have a lot of biodiversity. I’m pretty sure the only animals I see are rats, and pigeons. When I lived in New Jersey, I used to live in the middle of the woods. I would wake up everyday to the sounds of blue jays and robins singing to each other from separate trees and they would tango with each other in the sky. One of my earliest memories with a bird song however, was when I would visit my Grandparents house in Vermont, and my Grandma would wake me up to watch the Goldfinches sing. She would call them “Piggy Birds” since every morning they would devour all the birdseed we’d leave out for them. 

4. In your childhood, did you ever come up with or hear of an audacious idea to solve climate change? What was it? 

Climate change has always been an ongoing topic of conversation throughout my life. None of us want our lives changing forever, with no way to reverse the damage we’ve done. I remember having a silly conversation with my dad in the car where he thought “Surely, there is a simple solution to all of this.” He then addresses the issues with the melting of the ice caps. My dad explains that the smoke from forest fires tends to travel to the arctic and blankets itself on the ice caps, which turns them black. Black attracts sunlight which leads to the ice caps melting more rapidly. My father thinks there are two solutions: 

Paint the ice caps white

Build huge industrial snow machines to make up for the snow that is melting. 

Both seem like ambitious ideas but I appreciated the conversation none-the-less. 

5. What was your childhood connection to nature? Has the pandemic inspired a reconnection to awe, to trees, to skyscapes, wildlife? Please describe with details.