“bayou entanglements” @ The Silos SITE Gallery Oct 12 - Dec. 7, 2019

"bayou entanglements” is a new iteration of the BioArt Bayou-torium. The installation consisted of several parts: a projection of new video of the Houston’s bayou from above and below the water; a pond in the shape of the Janitor Fish fabricated from lumber and coated with concrete filler; and the retention of live plants and animals from the bayous. The flora in the pond are what is considered “invasive” to the ecosystem of Houston: alligator grass, elephant ear, Johnson grass and a mature Pterygoplichthys (the Janitor Fish), the invasive species introduced from South America.

"bayou entanglements” is a presentation of a philosophical proposition: what is considered “invasive” and “native” wildlife. Throughout the run of the exhibition, several times every Saturday, I conducted public conversations with visitors over our impositions of anthropomorphic rhetoric on the natural world, while questioning human notions and concerns for the “natural world”. These “open symposiums” would culminate in my revealing the Pterygoplichthys by gently lifting it from the pond for visitors to visual consider up close and touch.

“bayou entanglements” was included in “OUTTA SPACE” @ SITE Gallery Houston / the Silos at Sawyer Yards as part of Sculpture Month Houston on Oct 12th till Dec. 7th, 2019 and was curated by Antarctica Black and Volker Eisele. This dual themed exhibition introduces alternative visions towards the environmental and social issues challenging our planet. Also exhibiting are international artists, Suzanne Anker, Marc Dion, Lina Dib, Cindee Klement, Steven Parker, Margeaux Crump, Nicole Banowetz and others.

The BioArt Bayou-torium’s new iteration called "bayou entanglements", with live non-native plants and animals from Houston's bayous, engages in a public conversation over our nomenclature and regard for what is considered “invasive” and “native” wildlife. I argue, the lexicon we use to describe flora and fauna ultimately is more effective in describing ourselves, our attitudes and behaviors to the “natural world”.

Scroll below for the philosophical propositions, and the videos entitled "bayou entanglements" and “Janitor Fish performance Lecture”.

The BioArt Bayou-torium’s new iteration called "bayou entanglements", with live non-native plants and animals from Houston's bayous, engages in a public conversation over our nomenclature and regard for what is considered “invasive” and “native” wildlife. I argue, the lexicon and rhetoric we use to describe the behavior of flora and fauna ultimately is a tendency to personify non-human species and attribute our attitudes and behaviors to the “natural world”.

In the turbid waters of Buffalo Bayou and its tributaries exists a complex system of native, endangered and invasive species, all co-existing together.

One of the most memorable creatures now existing the Houston’s bayous is an archaic looking fish with the scientific name Pterygoplichthys (also known as the Janitor Fish), an “invasive” species introduced from South America.

The Pterygoplichthys is commonly mistaken for the Plecostomus which can be purchased easily from local pet stores. It differs from this aquarium sucker fish by their thick body armor and spiny dorsal fins that deter predators. Pterygoplichthys’ feed on algae and algae encrusted substrates. Arguably this contributes to a more oxygenated water, helps in limiting algae blooms for a less toxic environment for the aquatic inhabitants. The question is: to what level is this “invasive” or “migrant” species detrimental for the native species or, by developing viable adaptive synergies can the Janitor Fish actually support the existing biosphere.

This installation also attempts to engage the discourse over the policy of eradicating “non-native” species and debates whether various wildlife management programs are an anthropomorphic imposition on the plant/animal centered experience.

“bayou entanglements”

Naturalized, channelized, reinforced with aggregate, dredged, widened, directed and straightened, Houston & Harris County’s 22 watersheds and waterways take varieties of forms and functions. Channelization (concrete slopes and basins) entombs the intertidal zones and stream beds which once provided shelter and habitats for fauna, wildlife and wetlands. In what would otherwise filter the watershed and serve as badly need storm mediation, many of our bayous now serve as massive drainage ditches.

However, within the watershed’s naturalized riparian zones exist a complex ecosystem that is home to combinations of indigenous and non-native plants and animals. Like our growing understanding of storm and bayou management systems in a post Harvey world, the discourse around the subject of what is considered “invasive” versus “native” needs thorough reconsideration. Questions emerge: Can new dialogic engagements investigate alternative terminologies such as “introduced”, “migratory”, “animal seeded” and “spontaneously emerging” to describe non-native plants and animals? How do we reconcile practices of species extrication, evisceration and extermination in an age of global mass extinction? Are all “invasives” as great a threat to our biodiversity and changing ecosystems as the practices of human convenience, consumption and disposability that also drive the forces of ecological and biological transformation?

Our bayous and tributaries hold the Pterygoplichthys (the Janitor fish), an aquatic species introduced from South America. Commonly mistaken for the Plecostomus, the aquarium sucker fish found in local pet stores, the Janitor fish differs by their thick body armor and spiny dorsal fins that deter predators. Co-existing with “native” species, it’s true impact on the ecosystem is still undetermined. They survive despite an official policy of “evisceration and discard”. Algae encrusted concrete and aggregate, deposited to reinforced bayou shore lines, serve as a primary feeding ground for Pterygoplichthys’ which forage on vegetation, bottom sediment and floating debris coated with algae.

Public rhetoric over what is considered “invasive” range from the polemic, the militaristic, to the scientifically rigorous, and to creative speculation.

For example, there is the affinity to personify the natural world with human qualities. Human allegories of non-human species are rife throughout art and literature: from A Midsummer Nights Dream to Lord of the Rings; from ancient chimeric deities to surrealists paintings.

Contemporaneously, there is a temptation to envision the coexistence of different species in the natural world with the metaphor for living in the “celebrated” diversity of Houston. The monarch butterfly is an accepted symbol for the human right of migration freedom.

Problem arise when we impose human behavior on living beings and living matter that do not think or act human. Do plants and animal consider the act of “invading” when habitats become scarce, or when flora and fauna proliferate after humans transfer non-humans from one ecosystem to another?

These types of anthropomorphizing can also lead to a conflation of language and rhetoric when we regard our fellow species. The “de-humanization” of the other human is a predisposition all too common today.

Imperatives of ethical considerations and specificity of language should drive our conversations and policies over the myriad of global environmental and social justice issues.

The installation of “bayou entanglements” included this video which was projected on the wall of the Silos/SITE Gallery.