Documenting art and history with Erin Turner

Erin Turner- installation artist, painter, writer, and social practitioner- joins Melodie to talk about her first book, TOTEM as monument and archive, its place in the narrative of the Route 66 Centennial, and the reframing of art in public spaces. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Thank you for listening to Paperthral Podcast, a podcast for creatives, writers, and everybody involved in the book community in Tulsa. My name is Melody Coulter. I am the host. I am also the co-owner of Meadow Market Books and More in Tulsa. And today I am joined by Erin Turner, who's a sculptor, a painter, an installation artist, and newly published author of the book Totem, which is a collection of both essays and transcripts from panels and lectures done surrounding the Totem Park by Ed Galloway in Foyle, Oklahoma. Welcome, Erin. Thank you for having me.

unknown 0:39

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 0:39

It's such a pleasure. So this is the big, the big release week. What has that review been up to this week?

SPEAKER_00 0:48

Um, so we released the book on May 30th, kind of as a um a counter event to a lot of the, you know, big Route 66 celebrations in um maybe a little bit of an attempt to create, you know, a dialogue about acknowledgement of um alternative histories that are maybe not as celebrated or spoken about or um available in general. Um so we opened at the Center for Public Secrets with an exhibition that was a group show. Um there were a series of public installations, art installations. There's a billboard that's up right now at Sixth Thin Quincy. Um there were a few like wheat-pasted installations, and we have now transferred that exhibition to Pursuit Films, which is right behind Circle Cinema. Yeah. And that exhibition will be up um through the first of August. So it's kind of like the Center for Public Secrets is a beautiful space, but it's a little small, and so this was an opportunity to expand the show. Um, so yeah, that's what I've been up to in the last couple of weeks.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

I love that. Um Totem is uh an interesting read for me, revisiting it today after um we just did a book club for the store. We do our living room book club, and I had everybody read Blackbirds in the Sky, which is a YA um collection of history preceding documenting, and then everything that succeeded the Tulsa race massacre. And so reading that and then having this discussion about untold histories and very limited history and alternative histories um in one part of Tulsa's fabric, and then coming into totem was just really interesting to have two perspectives of Tulsa history in this time period and like I don't know, I appreciated it. And um, so I'm really excited to dig into all of it. Um, do you kind of maybe explain to listeners who aren't familiar with the Tobin Park um a little bit about the park itself and then how you got involved in the restoration project?

SPEAKER_00 3:33

Yeah, so um the um the exhibition itself, I think, is essentially a way of pulling these like ideas that were in public space to the contemporary. So I want to start with that because I'm gonna kind of go back and forth between like you know what's happening now and then the totem pole park. Yeah. Because I I like really wanted to make that happen in the book is this like bridge between two different time periods and two different worlds and two different ways of kind of um thinking about place. And um, you know, I think like I may be jumping ahead, but just this idea of like um public space is a really kind of key factor into how I consider the work that I do and and the park itself and where that situates itself. Because um Ed Galloway, who was the man who created this park, was a maker. He was a sculptor, and he made a bunch of things throughout his entire life. And he um he was born in Missouri and then moved to Oklahoma. Moved to Oklahoma in the very beginning, you know, of the 1900s. So he was like still Indian territory, Oklahoma. And the um I think his evolution, and that's something that I've thought about a lot, his evolution to create like a public sculpture park comes from, you know, decades and decades of actually making and and and sculpting and being an educator. He worked at the Sand Springs home that Charles Page um started. And so he was a real he was like an educator as well, and he was he was always a maker. And I think that's a really important um aspect of the story because as we kind of continue to think about the book and where it sits right now and and like what that project was about, it's kind of like thinking about who he was as an artist and how to kind of utilize that essence and spirit of what he was doing in both his his like professional life as an educator as well as like in his retirement life, which was creating this totem pole park, um, which he started building in like 1937. Um and essentially until he died in the early 60s. So he was constantly, I mean, the Totempole Park is a monument to the American Indian, as he's kind of um stated what his impetus was for building the park and and to like create a space where the first people of the land are celebrated. And so, you know, like just reading that straight faced, you're like, oh, that's a nice intention. But really delving into what that means and looks like, especially at the time um when Native people didn't have the right to voice that for themselves, then you kind of like, okay, so what are we actually looking at? And um so I will take a step back and say that my experience with the Totem Poe Park has been from restoring the structures out there. And and, you know, so I come from this, I come from a maker's place first and foremost in my engagement with the park. And it was an incredible project to kind of like learn about, you know, be um made aware of like artist-built environments as a genre and kind of understand like what that genre looks like throughout the world, but more specifically the United States, and um and kind of understand like like what this impetus for making is for many people. And I think what's really incredible about these like rural kind of artist-built environments is that it gives you like a sense of what was happening in rural America in these time periods where, you know, especially in the arts, we celebrate those in the canon, not those in the field. And so his park is really cool because he's like walking with a wheelbarrow to the back of his property line where there is a creek and pulling up sand and then collecting all of the field stones and creating this, you know, like this structure out of the Oklahoma landscape with neighbors dropping off bailing wire and telephone wire to reinforce um this, you know, 90-foot structure in the middle of the country. And so I kind of see the park as um, yeah, it was it was at the time, like maybe 10 years after Route 66 had kind of like been, you know, initiated as a as and only like a year or two after it had been like fully paved. Yeah. And it sits, the park sits like uh four miles off of Route 66, and that is the majority of the travel that presently goes to the the Totempole Park. So there's a part of the story that is very Route 66-based. Um and I kind of situate this place less as a roadside attraction, more as a monument. And I say that because um I I do actually think that there is more of an impetus than just like pull people in to actually like engage in the arts. Yeah, he was an artist and he was like constantly kind of through like interviews saying things like, you know, you have to like push your creativity, you have to like, you know, like be inspired through whatever you can. And as an arts educator, I kind of see the park as like, oh, he like wanted to bring the public and families and you know, people to be able to participate. He never charged for it. So it kind of like sits in this liminal space for me. And I I I don't take it as a straight, you know, roadside attraction, like come and give us a dollar to see the whatever. Um but yeah, it's a really kind of interesting site. And over the years of working, it was kind of like, you know, they had um there was another book that was establishing who Ed Galloway was right when I started working on the restoration project that left me kind of with way more questions than answers. And I think that was one of the like reasons for wanting to initiate more research and context building and really think critically about what the site is, both in the public sphere then and now, and how it can continue to be like a site of you know education. I think that's the biggest potential there. So that is what Ed Galloway's totem pole park is, and there are, I believe, 14 features. So it's not just the one totem pole. There's a gift shop that has a 12-sided room that is a 12-sided room um or structure, I should say. And inside of that structure, there are like original murals that he painted. Um, all of the structures outside, which include like fence posts and you know, like an arrowhead and some other um bird baths, a tree sculpture, there's like a lot of different features, but all of those um have over the years been restored two different times. So I will be the the second like large-scale restoration that goes in to kind of like refinish. I shouldn't say refinish, but what we did was um we took off all of the latex paint and replaced it with a silicate paint so that it lasts a lot longer and doesn't fade with the sun. It's it's like doesn't trap moisture, so it's better for the actual like substrate. Um so it was very much like a DIY project. And a lot of that reason is that these like artist-built environments sit in this category that is just well, what do we do with it?

unknown 12:35

You know?

SPEAKER_00 12:36

Um, and only I would say like in the last there's been, you know, a lot of research and and like community around protecting these spaces, but in the last, I would say four years, there's been like you know, of an annual convening of stewards and conservationists who are engaged in in artist-built environment sites in particular to share knowledge and share resources of how to um restore and and protect these kind of um all very I don't mean random in a derogatory sense, but they are sites that don't necessarily um have material consistency. And so there's a lot of like there's a lot of questions around conservation and ethics of how to kind of like continue to um preserve these sites into the future. And it is very much a labor of love. So I do also want to say that, you know, anybody who is involved in an artist-built environment like the totem pole park is, you know, spinning a lot of sweat equity to keep this thing alive because there is not like a funding body generally that is there to easily help. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:04

Um how did you get involved in in this particular project?

SPEAKER_00 14:12

I was at an a friend's studio who had old posters of the Totempole Park. Okay. And I had never thought about them prior to this one moment in his studio. I was like, oh, I don't know where those are. And he's like, really? They're an hour and a half away from here. You've never heard of this place? And so we went the next day, and when I was there at the gift shop, um, the woman kind of who was running the gift shop off-handedly said that they had been trying to find somebody to paint the totem for years, and I was like, Well, I can do that.

SPEAKER_01 14:55

Yeah, you because you mentioned you you talk a lot about coincidence, yeah. Um, especially in your in your opening essay, um, and about how you coincidentally got involved with this project and now like it's all coming together, and like, oh, it really was a coincidence because you're you're from Tulsa, and yet this like this exhibit, this this place has existed decades before you were born, and you know, essentially just down the road. So definitely coincidence.

SPEAKER_00 15:31

Yeah, and I find it funny that there's like very few people, at least before I started the restoration part project, that knew about it in my world. Yeah. Um it's so close and it's so it's so peculiar. You know, the the place is so peculiar and that I am surprised that it's not like visited more by local people. I don't know why that is.

SPEAKER_01 16:05

We don't appreciate what's in our backyard or because there are there are times where I mentioned places around Tulsa, and I'm not from Tulsa. I've been here 10 years. Like, oh yeah, you know, we've been on down to like even like Gilcrease, which is like a big name. Like, yeah, well, we went to Gilcrease, but we're like, what's that? I'm like, how damn you don't even know about that is really unfortunate. Yeah, it's it's it's disappointing and strange. And so when people say like, be a tourist in your own in your own home, like, yes, you have got to think like a tourist and go check out because you know there's this conversation that's had in I think the the second panel.

SPEAKER_00 16:48

Yeah, because Pablo Barrera um references one of his um associate curators and her like thesis project, which was based on like reading comments as a methodology for understanding space in the public. And they were like reading comments from the totem pole park and seeing those comments as like, oh, somebody's saying, like, well, I mean, it's okay, but like what a weird like Indian site or whatever.

SPEAKER_01 17:27

Conversation about how people um like they don't spend time in the actual indigenous communities when they come to Tulsa. Like somebody who's traveling Route 66 during the centennial is like not seeking those those spaces to actually learn. And so they're they end up at the totem pole park thinking that this is like a representation of Native American art in Oklahoma, which is just like fully factually incorrect. Um, but also an interesting piece of like how Oklahoma has engaged with native populations throughout its entire history as a territory and a state. Um, and so I think it's just like being a tourist in your own city is a way to like audit the message that we're sending to our visitors. Like, what are they seeing about Tulsa? Are they actually seeing Tulsa, or are they seeing like actually incorrect information, or are they just seeing like a very polished version? And in that polish, is that something that we want people to come away with thinking Tulsa is this way? And so, like I don't know, just it's it's key advice to think about with Tulsa and like make sure that we're aware of what people see. And I do love the concept, like there were conversations about like redoing the reviews, but also kind of like being an insurgent in there and allowing that to be a space where you're providing more context and information. And I thought that was really cool because as I read, as I read total, I'm like, well, but how do we explain to people? Because you can't have somebody just sitting out there all day saying, well, this is not how the indigenous people like there's not gonna be a funding for that.

SPEAKER_00 19:26

You can't ask somebody to spend that time in labor day after day, and so but that's been signage and like you know, other kinds of ways of engaging, like you know, curriculum or like I think there are so many ways to do that, and I mean, very honestly, I think that that is one thing that I mean it would be it would actually be so easy now with QR codes to go in and be able to access a lot of information without having somebody sitting there. And I do I I do think that the the like the read that has been done on this park in general has been very um I think very focused on who Ed Galloway was as a person and as an artisan, less on what does the site mean and how do people take this site away with them and how does that function in the present day? And how did it function in the past? And I think a lot of um yeah, a lot of the like work that needs to be done is to really engage a population that is a tourist population. So it takes time and it takes a lot of like um commitment with the community and the you know the people engaging with the park from kind of a a direct organizational standpoint. Um and it also takes time really thinking, you know, like who should be the voice behind that. Yeah, you know, and so I am hoping that the research presented in the book is a way of kind of opening up, like, oh, the this there's a lot of information that can spill out. And one of the intents behind a lot of the um the like lectures that are transcribed in the book was an intent to say, and what's missing and what would you do? Yeah. As a way of presenting, like a guide, you know, a guidelines. Like, well, these are a bunch of scholars, these are a bunch of people who are very knowledgeable about a lot of different facets that kind of fit into this very strange story and all of the convergences who. whose voice, you know, should be listened to in a lot of it. And thinking about what like what is missing from this conversation when you look at this park. Yeah. So that is the the essentially the impetus of the entire project. Like what is missing? What can we do? Whose voice should be there?

SPEAKER_01 22:23

And I I really enjoyed the like there's a a steady commentary throughout of reframing approaching specifically the park as more of a discussion on art and less is this meant to be something very educational about native cultures. And then like kind of juxtaposing that with monuments of you know other controversial moments. Like there's a lot of conversation about statues of Columbus and Confederate statue soldier um Confederate soldier statues and um like where in the conversation we have conversations about history and you know how this history is being presented person to person, artist to artist. And then you know in places where we can focus more on the artist and like the context for the impetus for building it I think we can have a more grounded discussion about these works and their place in our society rather than screaming and ripping pieces down without having that moment of connection as a community. And so I just I found that thread really like interesting. What was that like specifically in writing that that opening essay um what was that journey like for you kind of taking it from project to you know documentation?

SPEAKER_00 24:01

Yeah I was really interested in one of the things um that we did that is mentioned in the book but essentially the book is a is a repository for a big public project. And that public project um was a series of lectures but it was also like some hands-on workshops at the park where it was a much more intimate group that engaged with artists or activists or politicians in a very direct like you know intimate conversation about some of these these um questions and one of the things that we did that I thought was really you know important and I and I will kind of go back and say like this book I think is kind of both a methodology for placemaking as well as like um it's it's curatorial at its essence but it's also um yeah it's also about thinking about how to critically engage in dialogue and the thing that we did was everybody kind of you know got a short article about a different monument and intricacies with that monument and then you know we like swapped it around and had a conversation about what you know what was presented in that article and there were anything from you know it's a monument to umyate in New Mexico who is essentially the the founder of the state of New Mexico who was not both not celebrated at his time but you know massacred people and is now considered like the person who like every like is on all of the monuments to the state of New Mexico as the founder. And so like why and how did that happen at a time especially when he was like he was charged for all of his atrocities in real time and we're and also honored and now honored. Like why is he now honored right and so it's kind of that like rewriting and revisiting um and in my opinion you know there's all of these kind of like controversial monuments there are monuments to people who should not be monumentalized in my opinion but the the and I and I do think that you know like having artists take the role of um engaging in directing that conversation is really important because there is a creative process of like understanding and translating that is embedded into the role of the artist. And so this idea of the intervention instead of like just erasure in my opinion is so much more powerful because you're leaving space for somebody to think oh that was like that happened this monument like happened and we put it up in public space and why are we revisiting this? Oh it's because of you know like what is the intervention that actually critically examines both who is being monumentalized but why and when was it important to monumentalize that subject and then how do you kind of like shift the conversation so that the public can see all of that and be able to have a more like um complicated version of space because space and place are extremely complicated. And I think like these very like you know like linear reads of history is not real life. It's like the easy way to go about thinking about time. But I think that it's so much more important to you know complicate timelines. Yeah and to like visualize convergences as well.

SPEAKER_01 28:18

That was something that we particularly loved about Blackboards in the sky was that um we had a huge conversation book club was yesterday so like getting freshly mind about how when we teach history and especially when we are required to learn history we are just given essentially a timeline and you might go a little bit into depth in pockets of the timeline but you really don't receive a robust education in seeking different experiences of the timeline. You don't get a ton of like recontextualization like you know I didn't learn about the Tulsa race massacre in high school I didn't go to school in Oklahoma. And so all that I learned was in college and then in just adulthood um but even when students are taught about the Tulsa race massacre they're given like you know there was an altercation in an elevator and then Greenwood was gone and it's kind of very like but what was great about Blackbirds in the sky was that it started off with conversations about like slavery in Oklahoma and then it would visit like you know the lynching of a white man a year prior to the race massacre and then context of actual race riots that happened across the United States and it would jump back and talk about um like predominantly black towns and you know just providing all this information to view those days in Tulsa's history with a critical lens. How did we get here this wasn't just things were kind of tense in Tulsa and then they boiled over and so like there's so much importance in providing a full context and going back and revisiting the past and then taking those chunks of history and applying them to the present and having those conversations um which is like particularly prescient to be having those conversations around the centennial I know that like Reese Martin was at the at the second um the second lecture kind of talking like like okay yes I hear I hear what's going on and um I guess that kind of pulls me in a little bit of a shift in like how involved or aware of like the Route 66 commission's like involvement in kind of correcting or intervening really um in how Route 66 is presenting native culture and and these art pieces in general.

SPEAKER_00 31:15

It's a great question and I would be really um intrigued to see where Reese is on that. I would say that you know we had him at the totem pole park to give one of our kind of conversations that was focused around the Route 66 like um component and I think that that's important because in this project it the intent is not to like you know single somebody out or one of the things out it's to actually include and like create those bridges between a lot of different um parts of that history. So one of the things that um he said that he was going to do there's a there's a Route 66 and American in like I forget the exact title of it but it's created by Lisa Snell Hicks who is a Cherokee journalist who um actually you get the perspective of what tribes territories you're traveling as you pass Route 66 and the actual like native museums and um native owned businesses that you can visit along that route. And he said that he was going to like you know make that available as well in Oklahoma as like you know I believe there are 11 tribal nations that Route 66 passes through in Oklahoma and that is such a wealth of information to be had and like um so I think that was one super positive thing. There was another woman who is a part of the workshops who also works in tourism and you know she said that the like conversations at the the park really helped reframe like how she thinks about tourism and how to kind of like consider these you know very romantic notions of what um the past was and that is romantic for you know I don't want to say just like white people but it was a lot easier for white people to participate in these realities that you are now celebrating without kind of including other people's like experience and understanding that that was not the same experience across the board is negating so many people and it's continuing with the same kind of um the same things that were happening then. Exclusion, racism, you know it's just done in a very like quiet way.

SPEAKER_01 34:07

I wouldn't say always because we still have you know public lynchings some particularly loud but like it it's it's in some ways a little more insidious because it's it's subtle so it's it's invisible it's made invisible and very easy to to close your eyes and cover your ears and say that's not happening here.

SPEAKER_00 34:33

And then yeah. And I think there was um definitely I know that Reese was very um I mean he's always been really helpful in kind of um providing information for me if I needed you know a connection with something and so I know that he like is present and is participating. I think that so much needs to be done and a lot of signage is like it's important but it is just the first step. Yeah. There's so many more ways of engaging the public that are so much more interesting and I think um and I think that's why artists should take the step to kind of bridging the gap because you can be a commissioner or a director or somebody very passionate about something but if I you know I think to do it well you have to have a creative mind to think about how to engage in like a different modality and well art's all about communicating.

SPEAKER_01 35:43

Right it's all about taking taking what's happening in here and what your in your engagement with everything outside of you and creating something that like what's the word like like makes it real like puts it to paper puts it to a piece and communicates your experience with this with this moment and this feeling and takes it out there and I think you know yeah in in order to really fulfill the missions of of these different organizations you have to have a creative mindset or be working with people who have creative mindsets because they're the people that are going to take that mission and turn it into something tangible and that's what's going to like your community engagement with this tangible object is what is going to ultimately fulfill the mission and the vision of these organizations.

SPEAKER_00 36:48

So yeah and I think it's across the board I mean there's like such a I come from like a background of social practice and so you know from that background of thinking about socially engaged art it's like you know maybe there's not a ton of examples in Oklahoma but there are a ton of examples of artists who are partnered with the you know like um oh what's the agency that does all of the waste and sewage in New York City there's this artist Mir um Mira Latiman Ucules who was an artist in residence for 30 years with the sanitation department and she did a number of different like um you know activations with the the garbage collectors of New York City to kind of make visible how important that role is in our communal life of living in a city together. And I mean that is another invisibility essentially it's like well you don't want to like see or smell the waste and thank God there is somebody collecting it because if there wasn't we would have a real problem on our hands. And you know like I think that like it doesn't matter what organization I think bridging kind of this like like cross-disciplinary conversation will only be good no matter what for any agency for any and I I think also there's like a little bit of that kind of impetus in this book is like putting people together who don't cross paths you know like historians curators activists artists politicians who you know maybe are are thinking in totally different lines of inquiry but really you know I think curating that conversation is super interesting. Is this uh so shifting more into the personal is this a a project at scale when that you've done before or um I would say that I mean first of all this is my first book and that was a feat like that was a huge thing to truly truly is yeah um and so no I haven't done anything to the scale before I will say that like my practice in general has been from a very collaborative place and in Oklahoma I'm I'm like based in Brooklyn but I spend a lot of time in Oklahoma and I um and in other communities and I think like the the work that I was doing when I was a younger artist in Oklahoma was very collaborative at its essence. It was like engaging the dance community and the music community and like you know like creating kind of these like multi-sensory um performances or experiences. So in that sense yes that is kind of like the lineage that I kind of come from um participatory like really like bringing together a lot of different voices creatives whatever um so and I think that you know yeah as I look back a at a lot of the even the like work that I do in my own studio because I feel like I have both a public practice as well as a studio practice but my studio work is very similar. It's like bringing together conversations that then become um a visual output for the conversation.

SPEAKER_01 40:55

So that's awesome. Is that something that you think you want to return to something that's you know both like a very practical piece and then like engaging in this like research and public discourse surrounding the art are you are you saying something similar to like um a public park or monument or something like that or what are what are you specifically thinking? But just I'm just thinking about like all of these pieces together like you were engaged in the work of actually restoring the park but then you were also clearly doing research and engaging with the public and you know these events at the park and these lectures and then you know doing the work of putting together this book is that something that you think that you'd want to do again like engage in this very public and highly documented art experience?

SPEAKER_00 42:02

Yeah absolutely I mean I feel like that is kind of like what um I mean I think that the form of a book is a really good way for me to kind of like tie things together because in a lot of my like practice there's like there are already essays that tie you know like research together. And um I think the like more immediate projects that I am thinking about are much in the same vein. You know there's like a a research project that I initiated that is based on oil country in Oklahoma. And you know talking to a geologist and an oilman and a historian and really kind of like having this conversation with people whose worlds kind of may intersect slightly but also don't at all and I'm really interested in this idea that like well you everybody participates in space in a different way and so how do you like make visual all of those other ways of thinking and perceiving space that are your community um so there's like a a sculpture and a um kind of wall installation that's up right now at Pursuit Films that kind of is the initiation of that research made visible but it's kind of you know it's asking as well to be a site for a conversation to like actually you know hold a public conversation around like well what's the history of allotment? What's the history of oil? What's the history of the actual like I shouldn't say history but what is the geology that we're standing on um There's another residency that I have in St. Louis that's kind of from the same impetus at the Luminary Arts, which is an impetus to have a walk, you know, as the starting place for the conversation, and having each um different thinker or academic or artist or whatever engage with that same walk and show what they are seeing. And so it's kind of like becoming a repository for making visible like all of the different ways that we collectively participate in the same space. So I think like yes, in short, yes. As like a an artist who's interested in in place making. Um I think having and holding a space for different voices is super important. That it's not just like, I don't necessarily feel like my voice is the most important voice in the book. It's the one who's like framing the conversation, but it's like who is a part of the conversation that is important.

SPEAKER_01 45:13

And it feels very not just because it's largely transcripts of conversations, but the the every piece of it feels very much like you're sitting down having a conversation about the product and about the process and about Oklahoma history. And so I think that you have very successfully communicated like that vision here, and I I can see how that would transcribe well elsewhere. Um, I want to shift even more personally. Um just kind of walked through like your journey as an artist. So when when did you feel like oh yes, I I am an artist and I'm going to be an artist?

SPEAKER_00 46:02

Yeah. Um, it happened when I was 15, and I was like very artistic, but it wasn't until somebody put an oil paint in my hand and had me translate a watercolor that I had done into oil paint. Um, and I was like, oh, I'm a I'm a very clearly a painter. Like now I know exactly who I am, and there are no questions. And throughout like um my, you know, educational history, I tried to like be a physicist and an archaeologist and all of these other things where, you know, at the end of the day, I was like constantly just like pulled back into being an artist because I actually I just feel like that is truly who I am. Um and what's really amazing is that you can kind of pretend to be other things while you're an artist.

SPEAKER_01 47:05

So not unlike being a librarian. Yeah. Like get to try on other hats.

SPEAKER_00 47:10

Exactly. You get to really delve into like so many different like knowledge bases, and um so the evolution of my like art making has been like fully oil painting into um I am a very kind of transient soul as well, and and having an oil painting studio is a very um, you know, it's like a fire you have to tend constantly. So I stopped painting for a long time and and started doing large-scale sculptures out of ephemeral materials like newspaper, as um, I mean, I think it happened when I was in, I was traveling in Southeast Asia, and it was like the two materials that I could find no matter where I was was newspaper and chicken wire. And and like that became like the medium that I was using because it was accessible and um I think a low impact on the environment. It was easy to source, it was cheap, it was it was either cheap or found materials and um and so that kind of large-scale public sculpture, you know, I I started working with a lot of dancers and musicians as well to kind of do performances and that that kind of took um a different turn when I went to grad school. I went to grad school for social practice, and so it was a much more kind of um, you know, it was like the program that I went to is very like art activism, you know, in the political world as well, you know, thinking about what and how the arts can contribute, or how you can, you know, communicate certain things, or how you can even make art with a group of people. And so this is like a book and it was a public program, but that I consider to be like my art practice as well. Yeah. Um, because the whole thing was bringing together a group of people and really creating like you know, a monument in itself from this like archival impulse.

SPEAKER_01 49:38

I'm going to kind of wrap it with this question that I I ask everybody on here. And you're a very unique guest in that um you're not really coming from like the literature community. Um, and so I'm excited to hear um through this process, um, and particularly in assembling this book, um, what is something that has really surprised you or you found particularly interesting?

SPEAKER_00 50:11

Hmm.

SPEAKER_01 50:14

It's the stumper.

SPEAKER_00 50:16

I think that what was really amazing was to be able to all of a sudden instead of thinking about research as a very solitary endeavor, that it was my research was public in the sense that it came from other people's research, it came from conversation, it was like all of these conversations that led me to find so many different things that I didn't know about. So that I was leading the inquiry, but I was not like the other people led me to the research. Um, I think one of the most surprising things is how long it takes to get like photo rights for images. And once I was like in, I was like, well, I'm already this far in, I might as well like really go in. I think there are 195 images in this book, and it's like so many of them are sourced from so many different um historical societies all across the United States. So that was a really surprising um endeavor for me for sure.

SPEAKER_01 51:32

What I expected when when Stuart reached out to us about Totem. Um, but when we received it, I was like, there's just it's so much more visual than I anticipated. And not a single photo is wasted or superfluous. It's all so important in telling the story. Um that just thank you. I I appreciate thank you for for putting this together.

SPEAKER_00 52:00

And yeah, I mean, I think like one of the things that um as a visual artist, like I wanted it to be such a beautiful kind of like every single spread was thought about, and I was very lucky to work with um Ryan McGann, who was the designer of the book, who like really cared to make it beautiful on every single spread. And um I will say, like, I hope that you and anybody who's listening can come to the exhibition because essentially what the exhibition is is it's like the evolution of this idea, but it's really thinking about what the archive is and what ephemera is. It kind of like digs into this idea of the ephemera, which is essentially the the central thesis of the book, that you know, these sculptures were made by photographs and things that Ed Galloway would have seen in like the 20s and 30s that informed what he was building. And so the exhibition comes from that place of like really examining the ephemera of the era and also all of the ephemera that really kind of like is the research of the project, of the park, and also of like contemporary thinkers and artists who are present in the show and what their inspiration was and how that has kind of you know, it's like the idea of like what is your inspiration and what do you what do you pull from? And what and and so we've essentially made that visual in the exhibition.

SPEAKER_01 53:39

It's really like something like a wide engagement in in it's a it's a an entire piece in and of itself from the the part to the book to the exhibition and just very cool.

SPEAKER_00 53:56

Yeah, and I think that's one thing maybe that I want to just add is you know this idea of like it kind of being yes based on the Ed Galloway Totem Pool Park, but it's actually more about methodology and how anybody can think about using this format or you know, like method of complicating space of really like digging into history and like making visible a lot of the invisibilities. And so kind of the all of the ways that the art has kind of spilled out into the public, whether it be the exhibition or you know, the billboard or you know, these other kind of conversations that are being held, is is doing that. It's like showing, oh, there are like this can, you know, this is a format that can then translate to any place. You know, it becomes something that um yeah, it's it's a way of making visible histories in any community and really kind of like offering space for community to be their own archive, essentially.

SPEAKER_01 55:17

Well, thank you so much for joining me today. And um Totem as Monument and Archive by Erin Turner is available at Mettermarket Books. It's also available through Disland Press. Um so definitely grab it, engage with the I guess through August 1st. You know, a solid two months to make their way down there and check it out.

SPEAKER_00 55:45

Beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 55:46

Well, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 55:47

Yeah, thank you very much.

SPEAKER_01 55:48

Thank you for listening to Paper Girl Podcast. We will yeah with you later.