the garden lot that inspired A Lot (of
possibilities)

my article on NYC community gardens,
1997  

The project - about art, gardens and community - began in 2009 when I invited seven artists to submit work reflecting this window's view of a community garden. I renamed my apartment WinterSpace and began to arrange events and discussions in conjunction with exhibitions. I also formed a temporary Seasonal Coalition with Jo Q. Nelson and Nikki Schiro - as we all share an interest in mixing up private, public and functional aspects of exhibition spaces.

Nanna Debois Buhl
preparing for Traveling Plants

Sandra Eula Lee

For her mixed media installation, "Request a Street Tree," Sandra Eula Lee photographed trees and pavements of New York City, reflecting both on city-dwellers' innate need for nature, as well as their preconceived notions of 'nature' - and the occasionally tragicomic results.

Kenneth Rasmussen/Bifrost

From Denmark, Kenneth Rasmussen and Bifrost sent his Bikini With Spine and two long litho-prints depicting his own inner oasis.

Mark Inglis Taylor

Alumbrados wall piece by Laura Fayer and
Sandra Mack-Valencia
WinterSpace talk by Julia Nevarez on
progressive city planning in Medellin -
the city that inspired Alumbrados.

Left: from San Francisco, Mark Inglis Taylor mailed drawings he made (and culled from personal archive) in response to my description of the 104th St. Garden. The drawings are open to interpretation and served as props during my telling the story of the garden to the show's visitors. I placed one drawing on my TV and an earnest documentarian was born. He subsequently featured in a publication by Ladies of the Press.

left: Jonathan Velardi's Flamingo Parade
WinterSpace, 2010

Artists who submitted proposals to my open call - sent out to my own networks and posted on Wooloo.org: Norbert Francis Attard, David Barr, Suzanne Broughel, Jenny Carolin, Alyssa Casey, Laura Fayer, Leah Grimaldi, Bonnie Lane, Lisbeth Langkjær, Jodie Lyn-Kee-Chow, Coraline Meyer, Caroline Parks, Matt Pych, Aleksandr Razin, Jennifer SItron, Meg Studer, John Tursi, Sandra Mack-Valencia, Petra Valentova, Jonathan Velardi and Virginia Vergara.

Norbert Attard's installation, W. 104th
St. Community Garden  

In 2010, community garden contracts were up for re-negotiation with the city, and I facilitated and placed work by artists in the gardens, with the help of an MCAF grant. This was both a strategy to increase aesthetic pleasures for all as well as to increase the gardens' survival chances - adding 'sites of culture" to their already existing green and social capital. (I also collected over 300 signatures on behalf of the community gardens, in a sketch book.) The resolution brought continued existence for most of the NYC community gardens as long as they remain active.

Lisbeth Langkjaer
Danish article on Lisbeth Langkjaer's
glass beetles for the Mobilization for
Change Garden on 107th St., Manhattan.
The beetles' patterns are made via
imprints of NYC gardeners' hands.

Virginia Vergara

curator's essay  

A Lot of Possibilities, North Adams, MA,
curated by Valeria Federici, 2011

In 2011, A Lot made the transition to a gallery space in the form of Gallery 51, a university gallery in North Adams. For this exhibition on entire project, I made Wall Archive - stylized documentation - shown in conjunction with work by artists I'd placed in the gardens.

Curator Valeria Federici initiated a
collaboration with the local Houghton
Community Garden and Maria Mazzocco as
part of the exhibition. Mazzocco made
these planters that were displayed at
exhibition, sprouted during it, and
seeds were replanted after closing.

review
Wall Archive for tART Year 8,
Arts@Renaissance, NYC, 2011

For the second exhibition of Wall Archive, I integrated images from North Adams and initiated contact with the neighboring garden, Red Shed Garden, in Greenpoint, NYC.

Wall Archive, detail