Remnants
Photography series, 2024
Film/Video installation (in production), 2025
Film/Video installation (in production), 2025
In the Midwest, pioneer cemeteries established in the early 19th century are among the few areas of land spared from industrial agricultural development. Alongside the human remains they memorialize, these sites have accidentally preserved remnants of the native tallgrass prairie ecosystems that once covered the region. In ecology, “remnant” is a term for sites where native plant communities have not been significantly disturbed by human development.
Cemetery sites now provide rare spaces of survival and life for nonhuman beings and communities, and hold accidental, crucial archives of a threatened ecosystem.
Through moving image, photography and installation, Remnants travels through cemetery prairie remnants in Illinois, Iowa, and Indiana to reflect on environmental and spiritual care, the nature of memory, and the land’s mythologies and degradation.
Selected Images
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