Comes to Phoenix
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oday’s most urgent environmental threats — degraded lands, water scarcity, pollution and loss of natural diversity — reveal complex connections between nature and people. To protect one is to protect the other. To destroy one is to destroy the other. In 2008, the Conservancy challenged 10 worldrenowned designers to create objects from natural materials that come from ecologically important places where we work around the world, including Australia, Bolivia, Micronesia and China’s Yunnan Province. The designers used wood, plants, wool and other sustainable materials to produce intriguing products, revealing extraordinary stories about regeneration and the human connection to the Earth’s lands and waters. The result is Design for a Living World, an exhibition of photography, raw materials, video essays and the objects themselves — beautiful and unique in both form and function.
Design for a Living World will be at Phoenix’s Desert Botanical Garden from January 16 through April 1. “Every one of us has a stake in the future of Arizona and our planet. A simple step we can all take is to consider the products we buy, the water we use, and the impacts of those choices on both people and nature,” said Pat Graham, state director for the Conservancy in Arizona. “We’re delighted to bring Design for a Living World to Phoenix and share these amazing places, gifted designers and innovative solutions with our local supporters.”
Background A dugout canoe at Cururu, Bolivia © Ami Vitale Above Paulina Reyes from Kate Spade New York traveled to Bolivia, where she collaborated with carvers to develop designs for handbags using indigenous materials and techniques. © Ami Vitale Above Left A green handbag made in a Bolivian workshop with hand-carved FSC-certified wood tiles. © whippsphoto.com
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Designs from the Source Design for a Living World encourages us to think about the products we use — where they come from, how they are made and the impact they have on our planet. Exhibition designers, including Isaac Mizrahi and Paulina Reyes with Kate Spade New York, were challenged to explore the source of the raw materials they used and the communities that produce and depend on them. “We’re very excited to partner with The Nature Conservancy to host Design for a Living World,” said Elaine McGinn, exhibition project manager for Desert Botanical Garden. “The exhibition presents a great opportunity to showcase examples of applied sustainability and practices that benefit all of us.”
Highlighting Bolivia In central Bolivia, the moist Amazonian rainforest gently gives way to drier scrub forests — an area that is home to blue and yellow macaws, jaguar and endangered forest tortoise. Here, the indigenous Guarayo people carve and produce a wide array of wood products, including violins, boats and household furniture. However, their traditional way of life and the health of these forests are threatened by the expansion of large-scale soybean production and illegal and haphazard logging. The Conservancy and its partners are providing technical assistance to help local people profitably run a community-forestry enterprise and sustainably manage their forests. Products from wood harvested in Cururu are shipped to national and international markets bearing the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) seal of certification.
Highlighting Australia The Conservancy’s Gondwana Link project seeks to protect and restore 620 miles of bush land in southwestern Australia’s wilderness. This region harbors soils and rocks that hold some of the earliest traces of life on the planet, and it is one of the most biologically diverse places in the world.
Top Stephen Burks refines his drawings of a prototype he designed that is made from raspberry jamwood, a tree native to southwestern Australia. © Mackenzie Stroh Middle The Stirling Range in the Conservancy’s Gondwana Link project area of southwestern Australia © Ami Vitale Right Stephen Burks, inspired by his gathering trips in the Gondwana Link bush region of Australia, created a set of items carved from jamwood that allows for the easy collection and processing of plant-based materials for use in a skincare line. © Mackenzie Stroh
As part of the Gondwana Link project, raspberry jam wood, an important natural resource for aboriginal groups, is being planted along with sandalwood and quandong to help reduce water salinity that plagues this region. Using raspberry jam wood, New York industrial designer Stephen Burks created an exhibition piece meant to crush plant seeds, nuts and berries used for therapeutic or medicinal purposes.
Highlighting China China’s Yunnan Province holds four of Asia’s great rivers, deep gorges, vast mountains, and forests of bamboo and pine that shelter Asiatic black bears, red pandas and endangered Yunnan golden monkeys. However, deforestation and forest degradation threaten these areas. Working in more than 400 villages across the province, the Conservancy is helping reduce wood consumption by supporting sustainable economic development efforts, such as bamboo harvesting. continued on page 6 Field Notes: Fall 2011 | 5
Bamboo generates more oxygen than trees and absorbs large amounts of carbon while it provides humans a range of uses — food, fabric, flooring and “vegetal steel” used to construct furniture and buildings. Israeli industrial and furniture designer Ezri Tarazi used bamboo in his exhibition piece to create totem-like structures for the home, mainly providing various media functions.
Highlighting Mexico For nearly 70 years, villagers in Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula have made their livelihood from extracting chicle latex from the Manilkara zapota tree, though the practice of chicle harvesting reaches back thousands of years to their Mayan ancestors. Today, the forests are threatened by development, forest fires and agricultural expansion, causing local people to abandon the area for better economic opportunities. To preserve this culture, protect the forests and sustain the locals’ incomes, the Conservancy is working in Mexico’s Maya Forest to improve natural resource management, implement sustainable forestry, develop eco-tourism, and control or prevent forest fires. Dutch designer Hella Jongerius melted, molded, stretched and shaped chicle latex to create tactile surfaces on ceramic vessels for the exhibition. Complementing Jongerius’ project, Glee Gum, an organic, chiclebased gum maker, is creating a gum flavored with cardamom and honey from the Yucatán.
Highlighting Idaho Like the herds of elk and mule deer that migrate from valley to high country, the sheep of Lava Lake Ranch in Hailey, Idaho, travel hundreds of miles every summer. During the day, they dine on native grasses, forbs and even some weeds that other animals won’t eat. As night falls, border collies and Great Pyrenees dogs keep watch for wolves, coyotes and other predators. Today, thousands of acres of ranchland help preserve large mammal migrations by connecting public lands. But these open spaces are at risk from unplanned development. Lava Lake Ranch is forging a new path in sheep ranching. It devotes 100 percent of its profits to conservation. Working with the Conservancy, the ranch maintains an active research program and has developed a plan to conserve the native ecosystem. The Conservancy paired Lava Lake Ranch with Dutch designer Christien Meindertsma who is using the wool to create skeins of thick felted yarn and ultimately rugs, garments and other wool products.
Far Left A farmer carries a basket made of bamboo in Yunnan Province, China. © Ami Vitale Middle Harvesting bamboo © Ami Vitale Left This magazine rack is among the furniture designed by Israeli industrial and furniture designer Ezri Tarazi from bamboo collected in China’s Yunnan Province. © Udi Dagan
Background Right A field of blue penstemon, a flower indigenous to Idaho © Ami Vitale Right Top Sheep at the Lava Lake Ranch in Idaho Right Middle Christien Meindertsma working with oversized wool yarn from the Lava Lake Ranch to knit craft designs © Roel Van Tour Right Bottom Oversized wool yarn floor covering © Roel Van Tour
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Want to See the Exhibition? Design for a Living World will be at the Desert Botanical Garden, 1201 N. Galvin Parkway, Phoenix. It runs from January 16 through April 1. To learn more about the exhibition, please visit nature.org/arizona.
Sponsors The Phoenix presentation of the Design for a Living World exhibition is made possible by lead sponsor Northern Trust. Other sponsors include Arizona Public Service, Salt River Project, the Dorrance Family Foundation, First Solar, Walton Family Foundation and Cox Communications.
Special Dates for You The Desert Botanical Garden will provide free admission to Conservancy members Sundays through Thursdays from January 19 – February 29. Please use the attached coupon for admittance to the Garden.
Lectures for a Living World Presented by the Dorrance Family Foundation Journeys of Design and Conservation M. Sanjayan, the Conservancy’s lead scientist, will discuss how conservation and the use of natural resources can affect our lives and the environment. Sanjayan’s current work focuses on how conservation might be achieved in the poorest places on earth and how ecosystem services, if properly managed, can benefit both human and wildlife communities. His work has received extensive media coverage, from the New York Times to National Public Radio. Sanjayan’s lecture includes a tour of the Design for a Living World exhibit. Wednesday / January 25 / 6 p.m. Free / Desert Botanical Garden (Call 480-481-8188 for reservations) Speaker photos © Courtesy of the speakers
Design from the Desert The desert inspires the designs of renowned Phoenix-based architect Will Bruder. Bruder’s creative use of materials and light have resulted in 450 commissions, including such cultural landmarks as the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art and the Burton Barr/Phoenix Central Library. Bruder will present “Design from the Desert” at the Phoenix Art Museum to coincide with the exhibitions Frank Lloyd Wright: Organic Architecture for the 21st Century and Iconic Arizona: Celebrating the Arizona Centennial. Wednesday / February 8 / 7 p.m. / Free Phoenix Art Museum / Whiteman Hall 1625 North Central Avenue (Museum is open and free from 3 to 9 p.m.)
Design for the New Sustainable Revolution William McDonough is an internationally renowned designer and co-author of Cradle to Cradle, which offers practical steps for innovating within today’s economic environment. Time Magazine recognized him as a “Hero of the Planet” for his philosophy that re-invention of human industry is our best hope for a sustainable future. McDonough will discuss how an industrial system that “takes, makes and wastes” can create goods and services that generate ecological, social and economic value. This lecture is presented in collaboration with Arizona State University’s Global Institute of Sustainability. Wednesday / February 21 / 7 p.m. / Free ASU Downtown Campus AE England Building / 424 N Central Ave Field Notes: Fall 2011 | 7