Nature on a Concrete Canvas

  • Artist Christopher Griffin, the owner of the house, uses a long smooth bone to draw a picture after each swipe of the trowel (Photo by Karen Kelly)

Sometimes cities can seem like drab, impersonal places. But every once in a
while, you see a building that stops you in your tracks. Karen Kelly tells a story about a house designed to do just that:

Transcript

Sometimes cities can seem like drab, impersonal places. But, every once in a
while, you see a building that stops you in your tracks. Karen Kelly tells a story
about a house designed to do just that:


(sound of construction and trucks)

When you first see it, you’re just not sure.

A two-story house is being covered with marks etched in concrete.

Is it intentional? Or just a layer of construction?

Then you see a large black figure on the west side of the house and realize- oh, it’s
a whale. Waves are etched in the concrete around it. Walk around the corner and
you see flocks of birds flying over roughly drawn buildings.

(sound of scraping)

And just past the birds, there are three men working silently on a platform. Two
are spreading layers of fresh concrete.

The third is artist Christopher Griffin, the owner of the house. He uses a long
smooth bone to draw a picture after each swipe of the trowel – and before the
concrete sets.

He says he has to work fast.

“They would scrape the mud on and I would be going around them, over top of
them, actually right behind their trowel and there’s no chance to stand back; there’s
no chance to second guess.”

Griffin has been a professional artist in Ottawa, Canada for almost twenty years.

Griffin’s motivation was simple: his house really needed a new exterior. But the
regular stuff that people put on their houses didn’t feel right to him.

Instead, he thought he’d try some drawings like he’d seen in a photo of mud huts in
Africa.

“It was irregular; it was organic; it wasn’t pristine; it wasn’t crisp; it wasn’t
heartless. And that sort of quality was something I was after.”

(sound of chatting and scraping)

But while Griffin had this vision of giant sunflowers and caribou, contractors had
no idea what he was talking about.

Several told him it couldn’t be done.

Dan Charette is part of a team that was willing to give it a try.

“It’s a fantastic opportunity to bring our craftsmanship to a different level. There’s
a whole other creative level to what we do here with constructive behaviors, so it’s
really a lot of fun.”

For instance, the contractors suggested adding fly ash to the cement. It’s a
byproduct of burning coal and it also makes the cement more elastic.

Griffin liked that it was more environmentally friendly.

He also recycled building materials and added solar panels. But usually that’s not
what people see.

He says what really makes him feel good is when people just stop and stare.

“Absolute strangers stopping their cars, getting out and having a look. There’s a
teenage skateboarder who stopped and said, ‘Wow, awesome house.’”

Griffin says, in that way, his house has become a public space.

In fact, he argues everyone’s house is a public space.

And he suggests people think about what they want their house to say to someone
walking by.

For The Environment Report, I’m Karen Kelly.

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Safer Bags of Salad

There’s growing concern about the spinach and lettuce in your crisper. There have been
several recalls of bags of salad produce after they hit the grocery stores. The federal
government recently noted that food safety has become one of the biggest ongoing
problems facing agencies responsible for inspecting food. The result is a debate among
growers, food processors and conservation groups over how to better protect the food
supply. But environmental groups say some of the safeguards can harm wildlife. Chuck
Quirmbach reports:

Transcript

There’s growing concern about the spinach and lettuce in your crisper. There have been
several recalls of bags of salad produce after they hit the grocery stores. The federal
government recently noted that food safety has become one of the biggest ongoing
problems facing agencies responsible for inspecting food. The result is a debate among
growers, food processors and conservation groups over how to better protect the food
supply. But environmental groups say some of the safeguards can harm wildlife. Chuck
Quirmbach reports:


During the last year, people have died and hundreds of people have gotten sick because
of E. coli bacteria contamination of some produce. Farmers and food processors are
fighting in court over what officially caused the contamination. But in the Salinas Valley
of California, an area known as the nation’s Salad Bowl, the food processing industry is
trying to show consumers they can be confident about the safety of commercially-
produced leafy greens. Even processors who were not linked to last year’s E. coli scare
suffered a drop in sales. They’re anxious to show off their facilities and the safety
precautions they’ve taken.


Inside this large processing plant a million pounds of lettuce come through every day.
It’s washed in chlorinated water, some of it is mixed in with other raw vegetables and
packed into bags that are sent to grocery stores across the U.S. This plant is operated by
Fresh Express, a company owned by Chiquita Brands. Plant manager Phil Bradway says
the plant is sanitized daily:


“You generate organic material buildup and its extremely important on a regular and
consistent basis to remove that organic material before you continue to process a food
safe product and that’s why we’re rigorous about the seven-day-a-week sanitation activities in
our facilities.”


Fresh Express vice president Bill Clyburn says this salad bagging plant ships out a
product that is better protected than vegetables that are sent unbagged to the grocery
stores:


“We’re taking the precautions to wash the lettuce and make it clean. You take commodity
produce of any type, go into a grocery store and watch how many people pick it up,
breathe on it, put it back down and take another head of lettuce and how many people still
don’t wash that. You never hear about people getting sick on commodity lettuce ’cause
there’s no label to go back at.”


And Fresh Express says it’s not just conditions at the plant that they and other processors
are trying to control. In the last year, California growers came up with a voluntary
program to try to develop better agricultural practices. Things such as protecting farm
fields from contamination from animals. Fresh Express insists that its growers exceed the
standards so that no wildlife urine or fecal matter come into contact with the produce, but some farmers say the food processors have some unrealistic ideas.


(Sound of sprinkler)


A sprinkler waters crops at an organic farm. Grower Andrew Griffin says some food
industry giants want more fences around farms to help keep wildlife out of the fields. But
he says those won’t make a difference:


“Absolutely not. It’s ridiculous. You can’t fence out the birds. You can’t fence out the
sky… I mean I don’t know what they’re thinking.”


Griffin says a better solution would be reduce the growing concentration of agri-business
and not send so much of the Salad Bowl’s leafy greens through just a few processing
plants:


“So, if there’s a contamination of say the blade on the cutting machine, you have an
opportunity to contaminate salad that’s gonna feed a whole nation. Whereas if it was
diffuse, if we had a diffuse system and you had small farms in different places, you
wouldn’t have that same broad spectrum problem.”


And the skeptical farmers have allies in groups such as The Nature Conservancy.
Spokeswoman Chris Fischer says the new restrictions in the farm fields are affecting
wildlife habitat along streams and river. She says people across the nation who eat salads
should care about what happens to the environment of the Salinas valley:


“As both a consumer and a conservationist the sustainability of our farming and
watershed health and ultimately our water quality and public health is all wrapped up
together and unsustainable, unhealthy farm practices ultimately aren’t going to serve us
well.”


Fischer says some of the new restrictions on growers are based on the best available
research, but she’s concerned food processors are adding extra requirements that aren’t
based on good science. Recently news reports added to the debate about safety of leafy
greens that end up on your table. The Associated Press reported federal inspections of
both growers and processors of salad greens only happen about once every four years.


For the Environment Report, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

Related Links

Holy Grail of Great Lakes Shipwrecks Found?

  • For a long time, anything any diver salvaged could be claimed as his or her own. Since the Abandoned Shipwreck Act of 1987, anything divers find on public land remains public. But a new discovery may bend some rules. (Photo courtesy of NOAA)

A shipwreck hunter believes he might have found what’s been described as the Holy Grail of Great Lakes wrecks. His find has triggered a new debate over who can lay claim to historic shipwrecks and what should happen to them. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Sally Eisele reports:

Transcript

A shipwreck hunter believes he might have found what’s been described as the Holy Grail of Great Lakes wrecks. His find has triggered a new debate over who can lay claim to historic shipwrecks and what should happen to them. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Sally Eisele reports:


Of the thousands of shipwrecks in the Great Lakes, the wreck of the Griffin is probably the most legendary. For a few reasons. She was built by somebody legendary – French explorer Rene-Robert Cavalier Sieur de La Salle, she was the first European ship to sail the Upper Great Lakes… and she was the first to sink. Actually, she sank on her maiden voyage in 1769, not exactly one of La Salle’s bigger success stories. But the mystery she left behind is pretty big – and it has pretty well flummoxed Great Lakes historians for hundreds of years. Shipwreck scholar Steven Herald is the director of the Manistee County Historical Museum.


“The Griffin loaded its first and only freight cargo downbound at Green Bay, and there has never been a reliable report of anyone who has seen the vessel since. It left Green Bay and disappeared totally.”


Did she run aground? Sink to the bottom of Lake Michigan? No one knows, But Steven Libert, a long-time shipwreck hunter, thinks he might have found a clue. What he’s excited about appears to be a long, wooden pole sticking out of the sand in about 80 feet of water in northwestern Lake Michigan. It doesn’t look like much. But Rick Robol, the attorney for Libert’s company Great Lakes Exploration, says tests indicate it could date back to the 17th century. And it could be part of a ship.


“Great Lakes Exploration does not know at this point what is there. And it does not know whether in fact it is the Griffin or not. Certainly if it were the Griffin, it would be a very substantial find.”


Great Lakes Exploration has filed suit in federal court seeking salvage rights to the site. But the site is in Michigan waters and the state has filed a motion to have the case dismissed. State archaeologist John Halsey says whatever there is should belong to the public, not a private company.


“They have the money to go out and look, they have the money to go out and find, but what they don’t have is the permission to bring stuff up. That’s where the rubber meets the road.”


The state argues the Federal Abandoned Shipwreck Act of 1987 gives any state title to historic wrecks in its waters. Before its passage, pretty much anybody in a rubber suit could salvage shipwrecks. And they did – the evidence is rusting out in garages across the country. The federal law sought to protect these historic sites – which, in the cold fresh water of the Great Lakes, are often well-preserved time capsules. But Wisconsin shipwreck researcher, Brendon Baillod, says a number of cases have already shown the law is full of technical loopholes if you have the money and time to challenge it.


“We have a lot of wrecks that are open game legally. It really is up to the judge who gets the case before them.”


If Great Lakes Exploration does clear the legal hurdles, the next question will be academic. What should happen to their findings? Attorney Rick Robol says it all depends on what’s there.


“Really, shipwrecks have to be dealt with on a case by case basis. There are some shipwrecks that may best remain in situ, that is, on site, and there are other that should be recovered. It’s impossible to determine what’s best for a particular wreck without first scientifically studying it.”


At this stage, it’s anybody’s guess as to whether the site contains the remains of a ship or just a pile of very old scrapwood. But preservationists such as historian Steven Herald, argue anything of historical value should really just be left there.


“I’m a great one for leaving it where it is and studying it in as much detail as possible. The easiest way to preserve it is to keep it there.”


One thing is certain, any excavation would likely involve many years and millions of dollars. Oh, and there’s another possibility too, if in fact the Griffin is found. Technically, the vessel still belongs to France, which was in charge around here after all at the time of La Salle’s adventures.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Sally Eisele.

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