InSimulation: The Tecolote Biome — 2021
Interview with a Park Ranger – Ranger Erika Weikel
InSimulation stands for Installation Simulation, it was created from an appreciation of both physical simulated and installation environments. Its mission is to promote and advocate for mental and environmental health through the arts. InSimulation: The Tecolote Biome, is a deep mapping experience allowing participants to interact with the Tecolote Canyon Natural Park through an interactive map which includes stories of the fauna found in the Tecolote Canyon and its dependent species. Included in this project are several mini audio documentaries – interviews from the persons who helped advocate for the open space as well as the park’s rangers.
IG @InstallationSimulation
Graphic Design: Ayesa Love and Sabrina Davidson
Photography | Audio Capturing | Dashboard Editing: Sabrina Davidson
Animation: Ayesa Love + Sabrina Davidson
These audio files are from an independent inquiry into the happenings of the Bay Area environmental landscape and a project I was apart of called http://www.foodwebstories.com. Traveling to collect & share stories of food web dynamics, the intention was to expand this work from North America to various places around the world. Our first tours were of the Colorado River Basin/Delta and China.Each season brought about a new opportunity for storytelling and sharing. This page definitely features my evolution as an audio editor. I was so excited to venture into the creations of audio documentaries. With our River Basin tour, I was working on my computer during a stay at a nonprofit along the way.
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30 minute Audio /Podcast in which I acted as Audio Engineer. Crafted during the Winter Foodweb Stories Tour covering the Lower Colorado River Basin. Nik Bertulis and I had a wonderful conversation with Ecologist Kathleen Blair in Havasu City, Arizona.
30.35 minute Audio /Podcast once again performing audio engineering duties for Foodweb Stories. Another podcast of the Foodweb Stories Tour covering the Lower Colorado River Basin and Delta. Nik Bertulis and I once again having a really good information conversation with locals of the Colorado River Basin. Robert and Christina are the names of the Naturalist Interviewed. http://www.foodwebstories.com
Historical Urban Water Usage of the Desert West, in this interview you will hear Nik Bertulis of Foodweb Stories and Dig Cooperative and his conversation with Mark Hall-Patton. Mark Hall-Patton is the administrator of the Clark County Museum system and star expert of the History channel’s reality TV show Pawn Stars.
No one is more intimate with the muddy complexity of Lake Merritt’s species composition than Katie Noonan and her students from Oakland High School’s Environmental Science Academy. Click the orange circle to listen to their story.
Rafts of trash, throngs of park lovers and an astonishing array of estuary loving species flock to our nation’s first wildlife refuge. The Lake Merritt Institute’s Dr. Bailey waxes eloquent in this poetic tribute. Click the orange circle to listen.
This is by far one of the toughest works I have done with concerns to Food Web Stories. I have learned so much about what is happening on the Earth since going to Kauai.
By my fourth day on the island I received a call from the local health food store inviting me to be a possible staff member. By the next week I was the new cashier. The day before the call I had my first full day of volunteering on a local organic farm. Such a vital position for someone who would soon go totally raw vegan. The abundance of the land in fresh fruits and vegetables was undeniable. Lychee, organic papayas, and apple bananas were staples. These positions were key in learning about the cycle of organic food on the island. I was able to touch everything and assist in all of the processes from working with the compost, planting the starts, maintaining the plants, harvest, and selling them at the local farmers market and the health food store only 6 minutes away from where I was staying.
There was so much joy and sadness as I began to understand this story. I am grateful to the people I met along the way, to the advocates, and the general working people of Kauai for helping me throughout this process. These are the people who agreed to be interviewed, these are the people who welcomed me into their places of business, and granted me access to their own archives.
While editing this piece I laughed and I couldn’t help but to cry. The testimonies, the people and their fight to not be harmed by chemical drifts of pesticides which at one point was said to send many children on the west side to the nurses office. A man in one testimony states he was sick for weeks because of pesticide poisoning. He was only at his very own home. These are children who would call their elders uncle or aunti. These are people you meet sitting at the bus stop, standing in the isle of the store, or on the beach.
People practicing and living Aloha.
Stay tuned there are more interviews to share from Kauai.
Sabibi Davidson 