“How do we mark the flood?”

“How Do We Mark The Flood?”
11/23/2024
A day of collective healing and community resilience on the historic grounds of Warren Wilson College | Swannanoa, NC

About the Film (A Message from Swannatopia):

Prior to the storm, we had been planning an “Ambient Farm Stroll” outdoor land-arts happening at Warren Wilson College as part of our project “DEER FREAKS…and decoys,” a group exhibition at BMCM+AC below and in conjunction with The Farm at Black Mountain College. “DEER FREAKS…and decoys” explored the hyper-natural forces of attraction and repulsion informing our interactions with the landscapes we inhabit and the creative ways people propagate, shape, lure, and protect in their environments.  Both were originally set to open on September 27, 2024, but the storm hit and the museum didn’t reopen for some time until the power and water had been restored to downtown Asheville.   Now we are able to gather again in our studio in Swannanoa’s historic Beacon Village, we feel lucky every day that it- and we- are still here. 

When asked by the WWC farm manager to not cancel post-Helene, we pivoted our efforts with the help of the Art & Craft department and many friends and neighbors to create an event that included 45+ land-art installations by students and community members across 5 acres of farm and garden. This included song in the garden, bells in the wind, decorated deer in a gymnasium, a live scored puppet show, flying kites on a muddy field, sown clover, swine dazzlers, polaroid lifts, newly revealed clay, serenades by WWC old time bands, CROW, Drones In The Garden, and XOR,  a cider pressing by the Garden Crew, community meal and hog roast. We also had a Sunset Surprise with a salamander procession to the Pavillion to see LAPHAM feat. Kelsey Wishik, and then paraded with a giant caterpillar to Bryson Gymnasium to listen to Superflower, Ellicott Hooligan, April Wilson Vocal Ensemble, and danced along with A Clutch feat. DJ Hypervelvet, Loose Atlantis with projections by Abby Portner. Thank you to our dear MadFrog Anderson  for the production support and to Drop of Sun for helping with sound.

This was the first time since the storm that many folks had seen each other, and traveled from across the region to be together. We, of Swannatopia, remain in awe of the power of gathering this day brought. This video made by our friends Erin Brethauer & Tim Hussin beautifully captures our curious, playful, and kind community coming together through art, music, song, dance, and sculpture woven into the fabric of the landscape.

Thank you to BMCM+AC for your trust and support, for extending both exhibitions through March, and for hosting our closing reception puppet fashion show on March 14, 2025: “How Do We Disappear, Yet Still Be Seen?”. 

Thank you also to Buncombe County Special Collections for inviting “How Do We Mark The Flood?” and DEER FREAKS…and decoys to be included in the Come Hell Or High Water community memory project as part of the Carolina Record Shop creative residency from April-June 2025. And The Green Grass Grows All Around And Around And The Green Grass Grows All Around (aka Experimental Archives Club) invited our community to join us as we researched and relaxed, learned about trees and seeds from our arborist and farmer friends, and redirected our gaze toward the legume lagoons of our future. 

Love,

Swannatopia

Fig. 4. The Camouflaged Looper made by Oggie and performed at “How do we mark the flood?” and “How do we disappear yet still be seen?” Photo credit: Sean Dunlap

Fig. 5 and Fig. 6., Program for “How Do We Mark The Flood?”
Program + Map design by Swannatopia
Image credits: Polaroid lift of WWC field (back over) taken November 12, 2024 – Charlotte Taylor
Aerial photograph of WWC field taken Oct 13, 1964 – USGS Earth Explorer

Fig. 7. Polaroid lift workshop by Charlotte Taylor. Photo credit: BK Segall

Fig. 8, Clover Starts Us Over, 2024 – ongoing
Kathryn Moore’s drawing 1 class
Warren Wilson College Art + Craft Department
Clover seed drawing in the lower pig pasture at WWC Farm
Sown on Nov 23 2024, aerial photograph taken by Liam Miller

Fig 9. Stinky Delicious, wild clay found by Jenn Kaplan’s ceramics class after the storm

Fig 11. Back Door of Mariana’ s barn hat at the runway for “How do we disappear yet still be seen?” – Closing party and fashion Puppet show on Pi Day, March 14th, 2025. Photo by BMCM+AC Staff.

SWANNATOPIA  Artist Statement

If you are reading this, know that no one is in charge!

We, of Swannatopia, are a group of experimental artists headquartered in Swannanoa, North Carolina. Over the past decade, we have set out to defamiliarize the familiar, to nurture an immersive, whimsical, thoughtful, experience of empowerment and offer a glimpse of what is possible. We believe that cross-disciplinary collaborations are essential to cultivate a healthy community and to maximize creative potential. Our installations and happenings are mutually supportive, multigenerational endeavors that help us all—individual, group, and participant-observers—to dream bigger, together. 

To this end, we launched our “Experimental Art Club” in 2021. An experiment in and of itself, Experimental Art Club aims to facilitate the free exchange of knowledge, experience, tools, and materials, while bringing the people together to “make stuff for fun!” 

THIS LAND FILMS Artist Statement

Erin Brethauer and Tim Hussin are the filmmakers, photographers and co-founders behind This Land Films (@thislandfilms), a multi-disciplinary documentary production company and creative studio. Before filmmaking, we were newspaper photojournalists for over a decade at places like the San Francisco Chronicle, National Geographic and the Asheville Citizen-Times.

Our background in photography helps us notice and capture subtle moments when filming. We love immersing ourselves in community and following our intuition and curiosity. We believe this approach leads to unexpected and enlightening moments of connection between collaborators and viewers.

We are currently directing our second feature-length documentary film called Stray Embers, which is based in Paradise, California after the Camp Fire destroyed the town in 2018. Filmed over the course of five years, the documentary captures the loving bonds and inevitable tensions that arise when dozens of people (and their dogs) live under one roof after a natural disaster. The film is in post-production. You can watch a trailer at www.thislandfilms.com and follow along on Instagram at @strayembersfilm.