Trees of Tomorrow at the Clifford Gallery

Trees of Tomorrow: The Hidden Politics of Ornamental Street Trees, 2018

Margaretha Haughwout in collaboration with Cody Ann Herrmann and Julian Louis Phillips of the Social Practice Queens MFA program; Larissa Li, Angelica ‘Noguera, Diana Vazguez, Gabriella Heyward, Antonio Crespo, and Destiny Irazarry of the John Bowne High School Agricultural Department in Flushing, Queens; and Colgate student Benjamin Geisler.

Seeds, soil, tree foods, tree medicines, digital images, print materials

Trees of Tomorrow is walking tour, research-based inquiry, community art project, and roving speculative workstation. Rooted in Flushing, Queens, the location of the first commercial nurseries of the colonies, Trees of Tomorrow tracks the suspicious concurrence of globalized natures with trees as decoration, with trees as unpaid laborers. This ongoing project extends from my collaborative the Guerrilla Grafters, who graft fruit bearing branches onto sterile municipal fruit trees. Walking routes, archival images, traces of ongoing investigations into the histories and possible naturecultures for urban trees — are presented here.

Trees of Tomorrow project description
Trees of Tomorrow website