13 March 2009
Artist Jackie Brookner Unites Sculpture with Eco-Friendly Design
Collaborates with others to produce artwork designed to heal the planet
First in a series of four articles
Washington — Monumental sculpture, carved from stone or forged from metal, has undeniable drama, but can be perceived as cold and inert. Artist Jackie Brookner — who specializes in creating steel and concrete works that incorporate organic elements such as plants and water — has found a way to convert hard materials into art that seems to pulsate with life.
Brookner collaborates with communities, scientists, design professionals, educators and local governments to create vegetated sculptural systems that clean polluted water and raise awareness about the urgency of restoring health to Earth’s waters. “My living sculptures, called Biosculptures™, use natural-systems technology to provide ecological and aesthetic solutions to water-quality and water-quantity problems in urban and rural contexts,” she told America.gov.
According to Brookner, her trademarked Biosculptures “are biogeochemical filters that demonstrate how natural systems have the capacity to use pollutants and toxins as nutrients and resources — cleaning the air and purifying water in the process.” Using concrete, moss, ferns and water, Brookner collaborated with environmental reclamation artist Angelo Ciotti in 2004 to create Elders’ Cove, a landscape and sculpture complex in West Palm Beach, Florida.
The Elders’ Cove Biosculpture — a mass of tall, serpentine forms that rise gracefully from the water — is the complex’s dominant feature. Other features include sculpted mounds that reclaim excavated soil from flood-control ponds, cypress islands that recall the original Everglades ecosystem of the site, and a playground inspired by the culture of Florida’s Seminole Indian tribe.
“I’ve been practicing as a sculptor in a variety of media for about 40 years,” Brookner said. After 20 years of practice, she started to work directly with environmental issues, and now, “most of my work is centered on nature,” she explained. However, her career path took a surprising turn. “When I went to college, I was sure I was going to be a biologist,” she said. “But I took an art history class, and I learned how to see the world.”
After completing her education, Brookner was asked by Art Journal magazine to guest-edit an issue that was devoted to the theme of “Art and Ecology,” which propelled her to combine her interests in art and nature. “I knew that I wanted to make something that was functional and that presented solutions” to environmental problems, she said. “Changing people’s minds and behavior is important,” but so is beauty, “because it has a spiritual and emotional component. People respond to beauty, so I aim to create useful works that people want to look at.”
Self-taught as a sculptor, Brookner learned to weld so she could work with steel, and in the process she found her life’s calling. Pursuing her twin passions for art and the environment “has been a life-changing experience,” she said.
A recent project of hers — The Gift of Water, in Grossenhain, Germany — is part of a constructed wetland “that provides the only filtration for the town’s very large municipal swimming pool,” said Brookner. “No chemicals or chlorine, just plants!” The project’s focal point is a pair of giant sculpted hands, cupped together in a symbolic gesture that wordlessly conveys a nurturing touch.
“Ecological issues aren’t just about nature; they’re also about people,” Brookner said. “My work combines ecological and site-specific aspects, and people and communities.” She has joined forces with a number of collaborators over the years, and continues to seek new partnerships. “The synergy of a good collaborative effort is very exciting,” she said.
In addition to designing and producing Biosculptures, Brookner taught at Harvard University for a year and now teaches in the graduate program in fine arts at New York City’s Parsons School of Design.
More information on Brookner is available on her Web site.
