NESTCRAFT – Featuring the Ceramics of Mara Silver

When humans dispersed across the landscape, they unintentionally benefitted Barn Swallows and Cliff Swallows by creating structures such as barns, outbuildings, and bridges, which both species use as nesting sites. In spite of this, today both species are declining across significant portions of their ranges, due to habitat loss but also due to other anthropogenic factors, including climate change, pesticide use, and agricultural intensification.

Mara Silver, with a background in both ceramics and ornithology, has found that in spite of threats to the swallows, colonies can rebound when habitat is improved at the nesting-site level. One tool she uses for habitat restoration is clay nests formed to mimic natural nests. Each nest is handcrafted so no two are alike, and they are “unfinished.” The swallows can choose the one they prefer and finish it to their liking, adding pellets of mud beakful by beakful. By observing the swallows and their artful nests, Mara sought to “collaborate” with them, and thus return to the helpful role humans once played in their nesting.

Curated by Marcel O’Gorman and Jennifer Clary-Lemon of Critical Meda Lab (CML), the exhibition features study skins of swallows from the Royal Ontario Museum, barn timbers from the Waterloo Region, and a time-lapse video of human/swallow nestcraft. This project continues the CML’s commitment to research-creation about more-than-human infrastructure for species at risk.

With special thanks to:
Chris Rogers from Critical Media Lab for Exhibition Assistance and Web Development, Oliver Haddrath and Mark Peck from Royal Ontario Museum for Study Skin Assistance, Evan Gallon from Timeless Materials for Timber Preparation, Amy Toensing, David McIntyre & Tommi Pantti for photography and source video.

This project was funded in part by the Social Sciences and Research Council of Canada.