I want to create an installation about the past, present and future relationships between people of the Starnmeerpolder and their trees and forests. With this residency I want to extend my ongoing research on learning to life with forests through the local immersion in and around the Buitenwerkplaats. There I want to visit and study the specific ‘forests’ of the polder through ‘an art of noticing’, my personal engagement with these places and their human and non-human inhabitants.

The present small scale polder-forests like the windsingel on the farmyards, the public orchard of Markerbinnen, the arboretic dress of the nudists at ‘zon en leven’, peat swamp forests that once were, to name a few, will be unraveled through collages, films and collected objects portraying these places, their people and the tasks that forge their relationships. Finally I want create an installation and a printed booklet where these narratives unfold from the current bond between people and their environment.

The final part of the narrative is a story about a new forest in the polder that is inhabited by polder- dwellers of the future. Through this I want to explore what it means to become situated in a place again, within a re-read vernacular, right here and right now.

website Anna Fink
a Forest is a Garden is a Home; Anna’s Artist Talk