Ceremonial Pegs (2003). Intended to frame the mass grave for the wounded limbs.
Public Ceremony on the Southern Slope of the Andover Newton Theological School Hillside.
Earth Wounds, developed as a community project, paid homage to a small forest located across the street from my home. The wooded hillside represented the last open green space in the city’s center, sacrificed to raise tax revenues through urban development. The project included community members, a neighborhood school, city councilors and conservationists. I used ritual and ceremony to organize a community into action.
Earth Wounds began as a local project that grew to enormous proportions. The destruction of a small forest, my grandparents’ murder in a Latvian forest, and the terrorist attach of 911 appeared as a convergence of events. Earth is highlighted as a restorative element, bringing a semblance of closure to unbearable loss.
Mourning Shroud and acts of Kriah (2002). Mixed media. 54 x 40 X 4”.
Wounded tree limb embellished with historic documents, gauze, and wax (2002).
Detail of wounded limb. Layers of history sutured together., wrapped in gauze, encased in wax and shellac. My studio was transported into a place of remembrance--first wrapping the limbs with historic photos, and then turning the images into open wounds.
Wrapped tree limb for burial ceremony (2002)
Tree banner hung from lamp posts (2004). 60" x 30".
Tree Panels (2004). Iris gliclee and mixed media. 54 x 26.”
Stolen Lives (2003). Inkjet print of photos and mixed media. 26 x 38".
In the Light of Day (2002). Photographs, iris giclee print, earth, pigment, varnish medium and shellac, 26 x 38”. Tribute to 911.
Remembrance (2002). Mixed media on wood panel with soundtrack, 52 x 56 x 10”, Includes audio recording of chain saws and jet engines.
Community Program at Bowen School
Autopsy Report
Autopsy of the Forest, (2005). Images of the forest were printed on plastic and then adhered to a light box, to be illuminated from behind. The forest was embedded with drawings of a heart and a mind, indicative of the human capacity to observe and care for another living being.
Detail, brain. (2004).
Detail, heart. (2004)
Twenty-six acres of a wooded hillside, hundreds of years of self-sustaining growth, cut down in two days.
The scattered carcasses of large tree trunks reminded of Eastern European landscapes in 1942, strewn with the bodies of murdered Jews.
The hillside was flattened in preparation for the Newton Terrace gated community, filled with cookie-cutter million-dollar condominiums.
My name is Karen Frostig. I live on Cypress street. My house is as old as some of the trees that lived on the Andover Newton hillside. I was very sad when the trees were cut down. The idea to make a ceremony to honor these trees occurred to me about two years ago. I thought planting poems and messages to the trees written on scrolls made from twigs from the forest would be a good thing to do. The scrolls would disintegrate back into the earth the way that trees return to the earth after they die. We observe the life cycle when we see new trees sprouting in old forests.
I had another idea once the trees were cut down this past March. I realized we also needed to create a ceremony to honor the community members who worked so hard to protect the trees and the land. Sometimes it is important to be quiet, at other times, it is important to ask questions or disagree with decisions when you think there are other ways of solving problems. This community has stood together as a strong and vocal group, trying to make a difference that would benefit people and trees. This ceremony is to honor the trees lost and celebrate our work together. Dr. Kelly was very happy to host this event at the Bowen school and Amber Wenger helped children make scrolls and write messages about the trees, so that everyone could have a voice here today. –Karen Frostig, Bowen School, May 29, 2003.