Trees: Silent Tree with Geisel library in background
Creator
Allen, Terry (American conceptual artist and musician, born 1943) Rittermann, Philipp Scholz (American photographer, 1955 CE-) Stuart Collection (San Diego, Calif.)
Under copyright Constraint(s) on Use: This work is protected by the U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.C.). Use of this work beyond that allowed by "fair use" requires written permission of the UC Regents. Responsibility for obtaining permissions and any use and distribution of this work rests exclusively with the user and not the UC San Diego Library. Inquiries can be made to the UC San Diego Library program having custody of the work. Use: This work is available from the UC San Diego Library. This digital copy of the work is intended to support research, teaching, and private study.
Rights Holder and Contact
Rittermann, Philipp Scholz (American photographer, 1955 CE-)
Description
Architecture and City Planning Sculpture and Installations Garden and Landscape Decorative Arts, Utilitarian Objects and Interior Design Allen's diverse talents and experiences are highlighted in his first outdoor project, Trees, for the Stuart Collection. He remarks upon the continual loss of natural environment at UCSD by salvaging three eucalyptus trees from a grove razed to make way for new campus buildings. Two of these trees, preserved and encased in skins of lead, stand like ghosts within a eucalyptus grove between the Geisel Library and the Faculty Club. Although they ostensibly represent displacement or loss, these trees offer a kind of compensation: one emits a series of recorded songs and the other a lively sequence of poems and stories created and arranged specifically for this project. For the music tree, William T. Wiley, known for his paintings filled with literary puns and eccentric maps, sings Ghost Riders in the Sky, accompanying himself on a homemade instrument; West Texas singer Joe Ely sings Mona Lisa Squeeze My Guitar, while the Maines Brothers work pedal steel guitars, a Thai band plays, and filmmaker/musician David Byrne sings a song he composed especially for this project. For the literary tree, Bale Allen delivers his poem about scabs, the poet Philip Levine recites, plus there are Navajo chants, translations of Aztec poems, duck calls, and many other sound works. Trees is a continuous project and Allen and others are at work on future contributions. One could walk through the grove several times before noticing Allen's two unobtrusive trees. Not only do these trees reinvest a natural site with a literal sense of magic but they implicitly make connections between nature and death and the life of the spirit. It is not surprising that students have dubbed this area the "Enchanted Forest." At the entrance to the vast, geometric library the third tree of Allen's installation remains silent - perhaps another form of the tree of knowledge, perhaps a reminder that trees must be cut down to print books and build buildings, perhaps a dance form, or perhaps noting that one can acquire knowledge both through observation of nature and through research. "The Silent Tree (Tree of Contents) was later moved (1993) from its initial placement to the front of the Geisel Library after the expansion of the building eliminated the sculpture's original position." - Mary Beebe, Director of the Stuart Collection UC San Diego Library, UC San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0175 (https://library.ucsd.edu/dc/contact) Near the Geisel Library: University of California, San Diego; La Jolla, California, United States
landscape architecture sculpture public art installations outdoor sculpture political art site-specific works sound sculpture
Identifier
ark:/20775/bb85682073
Language
No linguistic content
Subject
Humor Recycling Contemporary Nature Satire Death Trees Tombs Forests American Adaptive reuse Libraries (buildings) University of California, San Diego--History UC San Diego Library Landscape architecture Sculpture Public art Installations Outdoor sculpture Political art Site-specific works Sound sculpture
If you're wondering about permissions and what you can do with this item, a good starting point is the "rights information" on this page. See our terms of use for more tips.
Share your story
Has Calisphere helped you advance your research, complete a project, or find something meaningful? We'd love to hear about it; please send us a message.
