MARCH 2013
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03.10.13
The Natural History Museum of Los Angeles commissioned me to shoot seed pods for an upcoming exhibit about biodiversity in Los Angeles. We collected specimens and I photographed for a section on the diet of foraging parrots.

Red flowering gum (Eucalyptus leucoxylon)
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NOVEMBER 2012
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11.07.12
I spent a week in Boston, collecting seed pods at the Arnold Arboretum at Harvard University. Over the next year, I’ll photograph each specimen and write its profile for an exhibit in Fall 2013. It was a good trip: The air was cold but bright, the pods were bountiful, and every tree was identified. Even though I do enjoy the search—sometimes long, often circuitous, surprisingly always fruitful—to identify a seed pod I’ve collected in the wild, this was a really nice convenience.

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09.20.12
After a couple weeks in Southern California, I returned to Portland to pick up my seed pods and head back to Los Angeles, where I’ve been working with jewelry designer and amateur entomologist Jennifer Herwitt. We’re designing specimen terrariums (my seed pods with her butterflies and beetles) for a new shop in downtown L.A. that will also feature my photographs. I’ve spent the past week framing prints in lots of sizes, including a 24×28 frame that looks fantastic. I’m excited for the show—my work will be alongside pieces by other talented artist and designers, and the specimens look so good as a group. The diversity of form is staggering.

Poppy (Papaver orientale) is the newest specimen, which I collected last fall in Portland. Welcome, little one!

The shop at 715 South Los Angeles St.
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09.03.12

An exciting recent find: seed pods of the Silk Floss tree (Ceiba speciosa). Walking along Fairfax with a bag of fresh rugula from Canters, I saw a pod in a canopy too high too reach (my height can be a liability in the specimen collecting field), but there were more trees further along Fairfax. I headed north towards Santa Monica and found these woody claws in the median strip’s tall grasses, just north of Beverly. How fabulous! Look at the flowers, the trunk, the fruits! What a tree. In the middle of the city, in a median strip no less! I love Los Angeles.

Silk Floss tree (Ceiba speciosa) seed pods

Silk Floss tree (Ceiba speciosa) flower, trunk & canopy ——————————————————————————————————————

06.05.12
Bravo, Emma & Eddie! We’ve launched This Is Fertile Ground, an interactive farm and non-linear video documentary about farming in the Fertile Crescent. I illustrated plant growth for the site’s stop-motion animation. All crops are native to Iraq and Iraqi Kurdistan, where a tradition of agriculture is endangered. Not only does the concept reflect the dilemma (low media attention to farmers in Iraq, and low agricultural capacity of their land), it’s a really nice model of incentive-based multi-media education.

Our farm fully grown, after about a hundred users have watched a video clip.

As users watch video clips from our documentary, a plant will grow, reinforcing the idea that growth is possible through a collective awareness and hearing the stories of Iraqi farmers. Lots of the clips are from our trip to Kurdistan last summer. We hope to further develop the content, create a section for users to contribute media, and refine the animation to include pollination, rain, and seed dispersal.

Our farm in early stages of growth, after a handful of video views.
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06.01.12
I spent some time in Dubai in 2009, producing a story with director Lauren Greenfield. Our invaluable man-on-the-ground was Mohamed Somji, photojournalist and director of Gulf Photo Plus, a Dubai-based photography organization. I loved working with Mohamed in Dubai, so it was really exciting to contribute to his latest initiative, a show of fine art prints by international photographers. I designed a four-fruit print exclusively for the show. If you’re in Dubai on June 6, stop by the show opening (7pm in Alserkal Avenue) on my behalf. After that, prints in four sizes will be available, in limited editions, online (if the link’s not active yet, it will be after the show launch).

Clockwise from upper left: Golden rain tree (Koelreuteria paniculata), California flannel bush (Fremontodendron californicum), Hawaiian wood rose (Merremia tuberosa), Painted trumpet vine (Clytostoma callistegioides)
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I’m sending several prints out today—a monkey pod tree canopy (Pithecellobium saman) and two seed pod prints for our hosts in Hawai’i. The seed pods are a wood rose (Merremia tuberosa) and a Kokio (Kokia drynarioides), both of which I collected in February.

Wood rose (Merremia tuberosa) and Kokio (Kokia drynarioides) (top); Monkey pod tree (Pithecellobium saman) (bottom)
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APRIL 2012
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04.01.12
I sent off three 11×14 framed prints to Montecito, California, where they’ll hang in the garden shop at Lotusland. All three seed pods—Lotus (Nelumbo nucifera), Australian blackwood (Acacia melanoxylon, and Sweetshade (Hymenosporum flavum)—are among those I collected at Lotusland last fall. It’s wonderful to think of their proxies returning home. Thanks to Karen Kester for selecting the prints.

Australian blackwood (Acacia melanoxylon); 11×14 print, 17×20 framed
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04.25.12
A recent article in Nature discusses the disappearance of plant collectors, and, among botanists, a shift from taxonony to molecular studies—from the field to the lab. I’m curious how this will affect the tenor of botanic education, and a dwindling plant literacy. While my specimen acquisitions haven’t taken me to the death-defying scenarios of those profiled in the article, I have fallen into a number of cacti, climbed a couple vertiginous cliffs, and encountered small armies of stinging ants. I don’t collect specimens that are exclusively rare, or undescribed—rather, I have been building a collection of common seed pods that are familiar to audiences. My photography and writing—each a profile of a seed pod, and its respective plant—encourages a new way to think about, and look at, those plants whose ubiquity often renders them invisible. From the proximate field, it’s my contribution to the ultimate one.

Seed pods from Hawai’i, waiting to be sorted and photographed.
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02.10.12
Aloha from Hawai’i, where a canopy of monkeypod trees fills the sky, and all sorts of seed pods cover the ground. Today I met with David Tan and Kate Logan at the Hawai’i Tropical Botanical Garden; we discussed a partnership with my project. Not many tropical plants are fruiting now, so David will be sending me seed pods to photograph until I can make a return trip to collect specimens myself. After our meeting I explored the Garden’s fantastic collection of Heliconias, gingers, and ferns.

Little club-moss (Selaginella spp.) at the Hawai’i Tropical Botanical Garden
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02.12.12
The good people at Nani Mau allowed me to collect specimens from their gardens. I found the annatto tree, a yellow catalpa, and several legumes I am still trying to identify. The curated grounds are generally used for weddings and events; today, all 20 acres were completely empty. A variety of tree canopies provided coverage when it lightly rained.

Traveler’s Palm (Ravenala madagascariensis) at Nani Mau Gardens
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02.18.12
For my final meeting in Hawai’i, I visited the Amy B Greenwood Ethnobotanical Garden, which focuses on recovering indigenous biodiversity, and cultivates a variety of endemic species. I met with Peter Van Dyke who permitted me to collect specimens, except from a couple rare plants that were suffering from the drought.

Leaves from a Koa tree (Acacia koa) at the Greenwood Ethnobotanical Garden
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02.27.12
Great news for two documentary films I’ve worked on over the past couple years. Lauren Greenfield‘s The Queen of Versailles was awarded Best Director at its Sundance premiere, and has been picked up by Bravo TV and Magnolia Pictures. I worked with Lauren during the film’s inception in 2009, and wrote the film’s early grants, including Sundance, Chicken & Egg, and Cinereach, all of which were awarded. I’ve also been writing grants for iLan Azoulai’s documentary Holy Ghetto. We are thrilled at its acceptance into Hot Doc’s pitch forum.

My dad and I took our dogs to the Arboretum most mornings this winter, and it was always wonderful to find ourselves in the clearing by the Mountain ash (Sorbus Aucuparia).
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DECEMBER 2011
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12.20.11
On our way to the Christmas holidays, Eddie, Emma and I met in New York City to work on a new site for The Iraqi Seed Project. We hope to launch sometime in Spring 2012; for now, I can tell you that we’re building an interactive garden of plants native to the Fertile Crescent. Eddie is programming, Emma is producing, and I am illustrating the garden with watercolor and pen & ink.

Seeds (chick pea, wheat, onion, grape, date palm, barley, cucumber) and a pomegranate tree.
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NOVEMBER 2011
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11.02.11
It’s a glorious drive, the 101 freeway between Los Angeles and Santa Barbara, and I spent a bit of time on it this month, making several trips to the gardens at Lotusland, in Montecito. I met with a fantastic group of people: Gwen Stauffer, Executive Director; Virginia Hayes, Curator of the Living Collections; Dorothy Shaner, Director of Public Progrmas; Deanna Hatch, Director of Communications; and Karen Kester, Shop Manager. They granted me permission to collect seed pod specimens in the gardens, and we discussed a forthcoming exhibit of my work. I’m thrilled to be part of the Lotusland community. And I received what is quite possibly the best compliment to date: “The Robert Mapplethorpe of Seed Pods.”

Bromeliad Garden at Lotusland
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Ocotillo (Fouquieria splendens) in Joshua Tree National Park
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10.15.11
A day with museum directors, landscape designers, and rare plant experts (Aaron Simms, I’m looking at you) at the Southern California Botanists symposium at Cal State Fullerton. This year’s theme was ‘Baja ¡Aha! Botanical Diversity of the Peninsula.’ Following the day of lectures, we had a wonderful dinner in the arboretum, and watched an evening film about local botanists. Exequiel Ezcurra was the keynote speaker and offered companion commentary to the film.

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10.22.11
I’ve been spending my days at the Pasadena Central Public Library, working on an article about our trip to Kurdistan. Today, I took my camera for a late afternoon break at the Huntington Gardens. Last week I was at the Huntington for Peter del Tredici’s lecture on the ginkgo tree.

Roses and ‘The Temple of Love’ limestone sculpture, in the rose garden at the Huntington.
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Milkvetch (Astragalus fasciculifolius)

Hollyhock (Alcea rose) near Jarmo, in northern Iraq.
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09.20.11
Autumn in Oregon is a bike ride to an island (Sauvie), and a walk through a maze (corn), and a field of heads (cabbages).

Each poster is a stately 18″ x 34″