GSD Alumni and Friends
Alexis Wreden, MLA '95
Alexis Wreden has secured grants to complete The
Wetlands Art Project, likely one of the first environmental art installations
at a national refuge. Wreden is an assistant professor of architecture
in the School of Architecture at Louisiana Tech University.
Modern art mingles with Black Bayou Refuge
By Kate Archer
Caddo Native American pottery was traded
on it. Tenant farmers plowed it. A defunct state fish hatchery left artificial
levees and ponds in it. When Alexis Wreden looks out at these 17 acres
of Monroe's Black Bayou Refuge, she smiles broadly and anticipates the
next phase of this land's history.
The assistant professor of architecture at Louisiana Tech has secured
nearly $20,000 in grants for the Wetlands Art Project, which mostly entails
art sculptures that will help people interpret the flora and fauna of
northeast Louisiana.
Working on landscape is very sensitive, subtle, and not very economically
feasible unless you stop and say other things matter more than money,"
Wreden said, scanning the rugged plain and talking above the steady hum
of cicadas. "The birds matter. The earth matters. The air matters.
This is why you make environmental art - to bring people out here and
have them learn about the site through experience and hopefully teach
people what an amazing natural resource they have here."
Wreden calls her sculpture installations "mudflat boathouses."
The sculpture designs meld the look of bird blinds, temporary huts, and
abstract art. The project also includes a series of decks, a Caddo pottery-inspired
snake walkway, informational signs about migratory birds, and a human
sundial which works like this: "You will stand here on this bull's-eye,
and your shadow will tell you what time it is - just in case you need
to know the time when you're bird-watching," she said.
Wreden's vision is one that will enhance the overall mission of Black
Bayou Refuge, refuge manager Kelby Ouchley said.
"Our primary objectives are environmental interpretation and education
- that is part of our mission in addition to taking care of all the critters
that are out here," said Ouchley, pointing to an alligator in one
of the ponds.
The Wetlands Art Project will also add aesthetic value to what was once
an industrial site. "This right here is by no means a pristine forest
or an untouched natural area because humans have been here and they've
built all of these ponds," Ouchley said.
Wreden is literally working on top of the remains of the fish hatchery.
Her art installations will rest on large cement slabs that once controlled
water levels in the ponds. "To pull these slabs out would be a big
mess and expensive. So I thought, let's put them to use in my sculptures."
When the sculptures are completed next spring, people will be able to
sit inside them and contemplate the natural setting. "I think it
is the type of space where nature and human beings can actually cohabit
harmoniously. And that's what I want to teach people to do."
Ouchley is proud to be "stepping outside the box" with Wreden's
work because he feels it will attract visitors to the refuge. He thinks
this is only the second wildlife refuge in the country to have an environmental
art project.
"There is no doubt in my mind that in ten to fifteen years this place
is really going to be an island or an oasis of wilderness in town, [based
on] the way Monroe is growing northward," he said. "And that
is all the more reason to do this type of thing here. It makes it easier
to get folks out here."
Ouchley is currently preparing for the Friends of Black Bayou annual fall
celebration, set for October 16. The event will include a groundbreaking
ceremony for a new wetlands learning center. Black Bayou Refuge, about
4500 acres in all, is located two miles north of Monroe on US Hwy 165.
More information on the Black
Bayou Refuge
Listen
to Black Bayou audio piece
Alexis Wreden, assistant professor of architecture, works on Wetlands Art Project Models at her home studio.