{"id":15217,"date":"2023-08-31T21:21:53","date_gmt":"2023-08-31T21:21:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hexagram.ca\/?p=15217"},"modified":"2025-02-25T11:47:39","modified_gmt":"2025-02-25T16:47:39","slug":"demo36-mediane-chair-devenir-hetre-en-devenir-installatif","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hexagram.ca\/en\/demo36-mediane-chair-devenir-hetre-en-devenir-installatif\/","title":{"rendered":"DEMO36 M\u00c9DIANE Research Chair – Devenir-h\u00eatre, becoming installation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

August 2023<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the conclusion of a research-creation residency at Hexagram, the completed draft of the third installation developed by M\u00c9DIANE<\/a> (Canada Research Chair in Arts, Ecotechnologies of Practices, and Climate Change) was presented for discussion with the Montreal community on March 16, 2023<\/a>. Following this, it transitioned to an exhibition in the forest at the Grantham Foundation for Art and Environment in May 2023.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n
Photo credit: S\u00e9bastien Huot<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Devenir-H\u00eatre<\/em> is the penultimate project in a cycle of four works and has been presented in various public spaces. The previous projects, bois eau m\u00e9tal<\/em><\/a> and Or\u00e9e des bois<\/em><\/a>, took place at the Arboretum of Espace pour la vie | Jardin Botanique de Montr\u00e9al (2021) and the C\u0153ur des sciences garden at UQAM (2022), respectively.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These projects are interconnected by shared methodologies. Since 2017, a team of scientists from DOT-Lab (under the direction of Nicolas B\u00e9langer, Universit\u00e9 T\u00c9LUQ) and Smartforests Canada (led by forest ecologist Daniel Kneeshaw, Department of Biological Sciences, UQAM) has been collecting data from birch, fir, and beech trees in the Laurentian and Lanaudi\u00e8re forests. Data is gathered via sensors, recording 24 readings per day from spring through autumn, as winter is a dormancy period in northern climates. Additionally, chronophotographic (time-lapse) images are captured at a rate of 4 to 6 per day. This collected and continuously synchronized data include various environmental and physiological parameters, such as water potential and soil temperature, sap flow, tree trunk circumference (tracking contraction and dilation due to sap fluctuations), as well as ambient temperature and humidity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These sets of quantitative and qualitative data reveal the tree\u2019s sensitive relationship with its environment\u2014its internal and external realities across time and space\u2014which would be difficult to access without the use of sensors. The data files are transmitted to the M\u00c9DIANE team, which works \u201cwith\u201d them alongside field explorations and consultations with the Smartforests Canada teams to design an installation art piece that visualizes these changing states. These artistic explorations are then presented within a scaffold structure that remains open to its surroundings in situ.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These “conductor relays” traverse each iteration of the works. However, they are modulated in various ways by thematic and aesthetic axes, as well as by specific agents, within a particular interface that interacts with different fields of expertise in both art and science. By facilitating exchanges between communities and knowledge, this interface promotes transdisciplinary reflection and action, extending the Chair\u2019s notion of “ecotechnologies of practice” to include citizenship and the more-than-human.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

2023 Iteration<\/u><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This work-laboratory stems from the collaboration of the research-creation cell \u00c6lab, formed by Gis\u00e8le Trudel (chairholder) and St\u00e9phane Claude (composer and specialist in immersive sound), and their artistic accomplices: Blandine Courcot, a scientist at DOT-Lab specializing in Big Data applied to environmental sciences (Universit\u00e9 T\u00c9LUQ), and Marc-Andr\u00e9 Cossette, an artist and PhD candidate at Concordia University specializing in interactive media. Their combined knowledge and sensitivities create the lived experience of Fagus grandifolia<\/em>, the American beech tree. Their work emerges from the data collected in 2020, recording the number of \u201cflash droughts\u201d that occurred that year to understand their effects on the tree\u2019s resilience. Blandine Courcot\u2019s research shows that this tree species can tolerate a certain number of short drought periods, which may even strengthen it in the context of high temperatures and water scarcity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For this iteration of the annual work, a series of LED screen tiles are arranged in two opposing semi-circles, creating an open niche in the woods. There is a convergence of past and present: the past space-time of data collection related to the beech tree, and the present reality of scientific and creative acts that animate it. The data visualization maps micro-movements and phenomena that occurred on a microscopic scale, but whose expression and concrete effects can be felt by the spectators.<\/p>\n\n\n