Walking, City Lights and Tree Spirits
by Sara Brodsky
For my senior project, I attempted to live in the spirit of Thoreau’s essay Walking, where he takes long walks alone to look inward and let go of the worries of the modern day. Ecofeminism uses the concept of gender to analyze relationships between humans and the natural world. Intrigued by this genre of thought, that places importance on the healing of nature in order to heal the larger oppression within human societies, I began my own journey. Many days were spent walking in Central Park, Prospect Park and Tompkins Square Park with my film camera and other days I spent meditating, reading, journaling and creating art. I developed my film and created a photography book and a video that shows, in visual form, my experience.
​
https://issuu.com/sarabrodsky21/docs/finalwalking
​
​
​
​
​
Artist Statement
Having been raised among the greenery of DC, I have always wondered about and felt inclined to explore the human relationships to nature. In middle and high school, I found photography and video has always been a way to represent my life in a way I didn’t know how to express. Recently, I have been thinking a lot about growing up, my Chilean roots, and the spiritual and scientific significance of forests. My senior project combined my love of walking, ecofeminism, meditation and photography to create a compilation of film photography, multimedia work and a video.
​
A couple years ago, my dad gifted me a book. Walking by Henry David Thoreau. I read it and I felt so connected to the way
My question became- is it possible to reconnect to the inner transcendentalist in the long walks through nature described in Thoreau’s essay Walking and what can nature teach us about self reflection, artmaking, and spirituality? French feminist author, Francoise d’Eaubonne, coined the term, ecofeminism in her book La Feminisme ou la Mort. Ecofeminism uses the concept of gender to analyze relationships between humans and the natural world. Intrigued by this genre of thought, that places importance on the healing of nature in order to heal the larger oppression within human societies, I began my own journey.
Many days were spent walking in Central Park, Prospect Park and Tompkins Square Park with my film camera and other days I spent meditating, reading, journaling and creating art. I developed my film and created a photography book and a video that shows, in visual form, my experience. I also have multimedia projects that mix journaling and photos to represent my deepest thoughts, questions and observations from the New York City park journeys. I used the juxtaposition of the natural landscapes next to the more gritty New York City photos to show the differences between many of our settings. Many of the images share a common theme questioning what is natural? I found to appease humanness as the source of this naturalness, I incorporated human bodies. Inspired by writers like Henry David Thoreau, Susan Sontag, and Susan Griffin, I incorporated their philosophies and artistic styles into my journaling and artwork.
Thoreau expressed the importance of long walks through nature for his own peace of mind. Susan Griffin emphasized a connection between the oppression of women and the exploitation of nature. Myself, as an 18 year old girl, living in New York, combined my love of these ideas along with my own experiences growing up to shape my understanding of the concept of “natural.” I created a video that touches on these subjects, specifically exploring what does it mean to grow up as a woman and find yourself lost within nature, yet leave and experience the raw, gritty beauty and humanity of the city, all at once? I found on my walks that I felt more grounded, aware and observant.
​
Selected clients
I'm a paragraph. Click here to add your own text and edit me. Let your users get to know you.
