For Those of Us Who Live at the Shoreline takes its title from the first line of Audre Lorde’s poem, “A litany for survival,” this newly commissioned large-scale vinyl artwork by artist La Vaughn Belle explores the relationship between the body, landscape, history, and memory. The topography depicted in the piece has been constructed by blending plant species that grow specifically near the coastline and function to both anchor and feed the soil. Species such as sea purslane, sea grape, manchineel, and mangroves are the keepers of boundary, constructing a kind of living archive from their roots systems which hold in the erosion of memory and time. They also protect, filter, and sometimes even poison, as part of dynamic marginal ecosystems. Belle’s work reminds us that for those who live at the shoreline—at the liminal spaces between subject and citizen—our survival is based on the crucial decisions of what remains rooted within us and what we know must wash away.
This piece is exhibited at Brookfield Place along with La Vaughn Belle’s other artwork, Chaney series (a topography of reconstruction), located in the 200 Vesey Corridor located between Tory Burch and Gucci. Both topographies that deal with fragmentation and hybridization.
Curated by Kendal Henry for Brookfield Place. Henry is an artist and curator who has specialized in the field of public art for nearly thirty years, and the Director of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs Percent for Art Program.
