Our ancestors' knowledge and value of the environment's flora was vital. Everywhere, they were surrounded by potential balms, poultices, pain relievers, euphoriants, and entheogens, using these systems as tools for the sustenance of their bodies and edification of their spirits. Yet, where these ethnobotanical gardens once grew now stand pharmacies with suspiciously clean white walls and endless supplies of medicine. While advancements in pharmacology are indeed essential, at the same time it’s unreasonable to not have a fundamental understanding of the plants from where they derived, along with the wisdom and value of the natural world left behind by our forebears.

Over the past ten years, I’ve been working on a project titled Vivarium, consisting of still life photographs and digital composites of medicinal flora growing throughout the southwest and beyond. Through this ethnobotanical survey, as I create each constructed photograph with inserted symbols and metaphors highlighting each plant’s unique history, not only is it my priority to document the flora with scientific precision for identification purposes, but I also have a curiosity for expanding the definition of the “still life,” pushing these techniques which emerged in the artist’s studio out into the plant’s environment. Furthermore, by accompanying each photograph with a description of the flora’s unique history, I also aspire to remind viewers of the magical, symbiotic role plants have played in our exploration of knowledge and well-being for hundreds of thousands of years.

Further reflecting this interest in the curious intersection of culture and nature, the project title Vivarium (Latin for “place of life”) refers to an enclosed space with plants or animals for observation and research purposes. This subtle act of concealing fragments of the natural world expresses a sense of power one has over something, much like science with nature, while also expressing great curiosity and love towards that same thing. From here, visual narratives of curiosity, containment, and control evolve as the conceptual framework that I explore throughout these photographs.