News of the Arroyo
Title: | His tree of life |
Subtitle: | Artist tends to lone sycamore in Rose Bowl parking lot |
Date: | 2006-10-05 |
Summary: | October 5, 2006 - Artist Joel Tauber has fallen big-tim for a lonely sycamore in the Rose Bowl parking lot. |
Author: | Janette Williams Staff Writer |
Publication: | Pasadena Star-News |
Content: | PASADENA - Of all the sycamore trees in all the parking lots in all the world, why did Joel Tauber fall for this one in Lot K at the Rose Bowl? \"Why do you fall in love with a particular person? Why do you care for a particular pet?\" mused the artist, who is making the tree the centerpiece of a permanent art installation. \"It\'s just this tree ...\" About 15 months ago, Tauber, 34, started his one-man effort to use the single platanus racemosa platanaceae, marooned in acres of blacktop, as a symbol of the barren urban environment and show how the smallest efforts can improve it. He noticed the 25-year-old tree, looking forlorn, on his trips to the nearby AAF Rose Bowl Aquatics Center. Then he watered it, using 20-gallon water bags, and built tree guards to protect it from cars. Then he branched out. \"Environmental philosophers have moved from trying to save the wilderness to trying to care for things stuck in our urban jungles,\" said Tauber, an Art Center College of Design graduate who lives in Eagle Rock and teaches video art at USC. \"So I started by watering this tree.\" His plans have preliminary support from the city and Rose Bowl officials - who even removed a 17-by-24-foot section of blacktop around the tree for him. Now he has designed a minipark around the sycamore, complete with a \"necklace\" of 18 white and red rocks, each to have a plaque telling the tree\'s story \"from the microscopic level of pathogens like anthracnose fungus to lacebugs and powdery mildew to all it does for the environment,\" Tauber said. Plus some dangling earring sculptures for special occasions. The whole effort will cost about $14,000, partly out of his pocket and partly in grants from arts organizations. Dressing up the tree in earrings and a necklace isn\'t an entirely original idea, Tauber said. He got it from an old story that tells of Xerxes, the ancient Persian king, who so loved a particular sycamore that he adorned it with golden ornaments and gave it its own royal bodyguard. \"Xerxes,\" Tauber said. \"So he invaded Greece - he\'s still a hero of mine.\" Darryl Dunn, general manager at the Rose Bowl, said Tauber was \"passionate\" about the tree. \"And fortunately the tree he\'s trying to enhance is already in good health, although it is in the parking lot,\" Dunn said. After talking to Tauber and city officials, Dunn said, everyone at the Rose Bowl has done their best to find a way for Tauber to \"attain his goals\" while maintaining parking spots. \"I think, overall, to people who come to the Rose Bowl, who park early and tailgate, it will be a reminder of the fact that we are in a park,\" Dunn said. \"But there is a functionality issue. It is a parking lot.\" Jonathon Glus, the city\'s executive arts director, likes the idea that Tauber\'s project, as described to him, addresses the idea of \"nature engulfed in a man-made environment.\" Not all Rose Bowl visitors are aware of the importance of its site in the Arroyo Seco, Glus said, \"so this is a small way to address that and remind us that we\'re borrowing the space.\" In more practical terms, Tauber\'s plan highlights both the plight of parking-lot trees and the need for them, Councilman Sid Tyler said. \"What he\'s doing is something pretty unique ... imagination is a wonderful thing, to the extent to which it has a constructive community message,\" Tyler said. May Lohan, who comes to the Rose Bowl twice a week with her Chihuahuas, Maxwell and Romeo, said she likes the idea of a little park among the parking spaces. \"I think it will be wonderful,\" she said. \"But I\'ll have to keep my dogs away - they have a tendency to, um, mark their territory.\" janette.williams@sgvn.com (626) 578-6300, Ext. 4482 |
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