The Columbia River Basin spans 258,000 square miles and the river meanders through mountain ranges, forests, grasslands, and deserts on its long journey to the Pacific Ocean. This vast body of water supports an interwoven web of life from salmon and osprey to douglas fir and arrowleaf balsamroot. The length of the river that informs and inspires this piece begins near the Harphan Creek tributary, it then flows through the constriction of the Bonneville Dam hydroelectric power plant, and ends near the Tumalt Creek tributary. These river miles are held between mountains and dense forests and join with many draining tributaries including Eagle Creek from its headwaters at Wahtum Lake. Chloë created this artwork using metal, wood, and woven plant material, each element holding meaning that reflect this moment in time and acknowledge the cycles of change that are yet to come.
Resilience
The Columbia River has been heavily developed since the 1930’s and currently has 14 hydroelectric dams on the mainstream river. Since the introduction of infrastructure on the Columbia, the river’s flow patterns have been greatly manipulated and have negatively impacted the biodiverse estuarine ecosystem and place-based and subsistence lifeways of the First Peoples of the Columbia River who have lived and subsisted here since time immemorial.
Metal
Chloë collaborated with MacRae Wylde, a local sculptor to create a metal loom using pressure and heat to bend and fuse round lengths of steel. The material itself mirrors the rigidity of imposed infrastructure along the Columbia River, while the curvature of the form carries the fluidity and resilience of water, adapting and shifting with both the rhythmic patterns of seasonal change in the landscape and the impacts of civilization.
Regeneration
In 2017, beginning in September, 48,000 square miles of forest burned in the Columbia River Gorge with the fire originating at the Eagle Creek tributary. Although the ignition of this fire was human caused, the scale and ferocity was due to years of fire suppression, deforestation, and climate change. Fire is an integral part of the circular rhythms of the natural world. Indigenous communities across the globe have practiced regenerative land tending through fire for thousands of years to support ecological diversity and resilience. Eagle Creek is a place woven into Chloë’s personal story. Two days before the fire, she revisited the familiar creeks, maidenhair fern shelves beneath the forest canopy, and the embrace of the valley as she meandered the twisting path to the refreshing cold water one last time before it was met with fiery change. Being in close relationship with this place throughout the seasons of the year as well as the seasons of her life, amplified the feeling of loss of a sacred forest home as she knew it. Like all cycles, both personal and ecological, the presence of fire and ash create fertile ground for growth to begin again.
Wood
The black wooden frame that holds the river section was created using Yakisugi/Shou Sugi Ban, a traditional Japanese method of preserving wood by applying fire to slightly burn and blacken the surface. Chloë returned to the confluence of Eagle Creek and the Columbia to glean charcoal from the remains of the Eagle Creek fire. She ground the charcoal into a fine powder and used a muller to blend it with beeswax and pine tar to create a black soot pigment. The pigment was then painted on the wood to embody the balance of regeneration, from fertile ashes new life begins to germinate and blossom.
Reconnection
The water of the Columbia River Basin supports a web of endemic and introduced plant species such as cattail, willow, himalayan blackberry, and scotch broom. Chloë explores working with green “waste” from gardens and public lands as a means of repurposing abundant and aggressively growing introduced plant species as creative material for making. She focuses on reimagining our current relationship and harmful chemical removal methods through land tending, hands-on community engagement, and relearning innate ancestral hand crafts, such as basket weaving and cordage making.
Flora
Chloë was paired with two local community partners for the Exquisite Gorge project, Arts in Education of the Gorge and The History Museum of Hood River. She taught cordage making workshops using plant materials and hosted conversations around relearning this integral and ancestral technique. Cordage is one of the first human fiber technologies that has been practiced across cultures around the globe for the span of human existence. Chloë visited Adam Smith’s 7th grade classes as a guest Teaching Artist at the Hood River Middle School. The students wove lengths of cordage and found curricular connections with their studies of riparian plants and ecosystems. She also engaged community participants at The Hood River History Museum in cordage making workshops. The lengths of cordage created with community are woven into artwork.
The woven flora represented in this piece includes both native and introduced plant species such as, himalayan blackberry, willow, european beach grass, iris, day lily, and cattail leaves. Chloë explores fiber processing and weaving techniques that she has learned and gathered from weaving teachers and community skill sharing opportunities over the past decade. These plants and patterns hold a long lineage of knowledge that embody the innate and interwoven relationship between people and the places we live in connection with.
Chloë began as a Studio Intern at Wildcraft in 2015 and assisted with classes in Chelsea Heffner’s small studio in White Salmon, Washington. As an intern, she and Kayla Powers collaborated to create a woven textile project focused on archiving the diverse color of Columbia Gorge dye plants. Chloë has been with Wildcraft for over 6 years and teaches a wide variety of classes including basket weaving, plant dyeing, wreath making and more. Visit Wildcraft Studio School's Website to see her class offerings.
