Work from the Studio: Ellie Irons

INTERVENTIONS IN NATURE

Yellow Vines in the Carriage House Park

Unexpected composition: Our yellow ladder with Ellie's yellow vine

Ellie Irons creates a variety of work, including installations that are based on her interventions and subtle additions to the natural world around her. During her Studio Residency, she fashioned a bright yellow vine from debris left by Hurricane Irene in the park at Brookwood Hall--where the Carriage House is located. She then attached the vine to an existing tree near our lake and photographed the process. Although the lake paths are heavily traveled, few visitors studied their environment close enough to notice the strange addition--the point of the work.

Ellie filming her installation

Ellie described her experience, posted an account to her blog and took some stunning photographs while she was in residence. Take a look  and enjoy.

Her blog post:

http://blog.ellieirons.com/post/12099193141/carriage-house-in-process

Her photographs:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/eirons/sets/72157627882857487/

And here's what she wrote:

"I've never explored a small, suburban patch of wilderness with the same attention to detail I would use in a larger, more expansive "truer" wilderness. Proximity to the patchwork of small parks and forested lands in suburban Long Island has allowed me to develop a very specific relationship to these isolated patches of forest...watching the changing of the seasons, and working in direct relationship to those changing has been really valuable."

"I've further developed my concept of working "site-responsively" during this stay (as opposed to "site-specifically"). I've heard the term "site-specific" a few times before, and found it compelling. My time in Islip has demonstrated to me that this descriptor really does fit the way I work. I came to the Carriage House with a plan to work in the studio space creating a large-scale evolving sculptural piece that I would film over time for a video project. I ended up doing just that, but my large-scale changing sculpture became the forest outside my door, rather than what I built inside. The work I did inside became a direct response to what I found outside in the landscape. The Carriage House grounds are a fascinatingly hybrid place- the interior structure of my studio was totally compelling, with lots of freedom to work directly with the architecture, and the roll up garage-style gate provided the kind of access between interior and exterior that I would love to have in all my workspaces...and direct access to the hybrid landscape outside (suburban park/miniature wildnerness/forgotten forest) was really stimulating for my working style."

"I further developed/honed a theoretical relationship to my work that I've been struggling to pin down over the last year...the chance to integrate my studio process directly with a long term relationship to a local outdoor environment was really unique and invaluable for me."