PHOTOGRAPH

Tricolored Heron (Egretta tricolor)

Easily identified by the long white stripe down the middle of its neck, the Tricolored Heron, once known as the Louisiana Heron, is a beautiful bird. They tend to dance around when hunting, darting back and forth in shallow water when tides are low, but in a more controlled, seemingly choreographed manner than their Reddish Egret counterparts.

In a more lazy, but undeniably smart move, they sometimes trail behind a hunting Cormorant or Grebe and snatch up any fish that escape the clutches of the first mouth. While growing up, Tricolored teens can get quite uppity. They commonly snap and lunge at their parents when they arrive with food, behavior that compels parents to arrive with sticks as gifts, perhaps in an effort to mellow out the kids. Nests are also made of sticks as they build platforms in the tops of mangroves or other trees.

LOCATION

Green Cay Wetlands, Boynton Beach, FL

The Green Cay Wetlands were created in 2004, converted from farmland in Boynton Beach. The park is a water reclamation center, similar to the Wakodahatchee Wetlands, naturally filtering millions of gallons of waste water each day.

A raised boardwalk through the property allows visitors to be as close or closer to the wildlife as one would be in a zoo, yet here they are free, in their natural landscape, exhibiting their wild behaviors.

Although only two miles from Wakodahatchee, there’s notable difference in the species prevalent in each location. This shows how small differences in ecosystems can have a large impacts on the species that inhabit them. Taken into a different context this is a very apt example for how great an effect climate change can have on ecosystems that are changing rapidly.

FRAME

Cuban Mahogany (Swietenia mahagoni)

Cuban Mahogany is one of three species of Mahogany and it was originally the most widely used of the three. Nowadays, Honduran Mahogany is the much more prevalent wood and what most people would recognize as Mahogany. Native to the Carribbean, Cuban Mahogany’s northernmost range does include the far south of Florida, including the Keys. I happen to get all of my Cuban Mahogany from a salvager in the Keys who removes the trees from construction sites before cutting it into slabs and drying it.

THE ELEMENTS

Fire, Water, Earth, and Air

In the display case in the bottom of the frame, four items are in preserved glass vials. The items represent the elements: fire (wood charcoal), water (mineral oil), earth (soil), and air (a milkweed seed). I include these items in my work as a symbol of the interconnectedness of all life on Earth, and as a reminder that humans must do better.

THE PLAQUE

Magnetic Information Plaque

I engrave a wooden information plaque for each work. The plaque includes what the photograph is of, the location of the photograph, what type of wood the frame is made of, and where I sourced the wood. The plaques also explain why the vials are included in each work. The back of each plaque states the meaning of my logo: “The circle represents our home, Planet Earth. The hourglass represents time. The five horizontal lines in the bottom of the hourglass represent the five mass extinction periods that have occurred in the past. The single line falling through the hourglass represents our current mass extinction period, caused by us.” The plaques are attached magnetically and can be removed to read or to store on the back of each frame if you prefer not to have it displayed on the front.