Christian Bell
Theatre Arts and Dance, College of Liberal Arts
MnDRIVE Area: Global Food

MnDRIVE Human in the Data Fellow, Summer 2021

Performing Citizen Science: Facilitating Interdisciplinary Creative Collaborations for a Public Audience at Franconia Sculpture Park

My IAS research foregrounds performance as both practice and mode of analysis to engage with Citizen Science data on invasive plant species at Franconia Sculpture Park. I approach Citizen Science data as a performance practitioner and scholar with an interest in: 1) The way data both supports and restricts the narratives of “native” and “invasive”; and 2) How community-driven creative practice might amplify the ethical, political, and historical stakes of land stewardship. The proposed research will culminate with performance interventions at Franconia Sculpture Park presented in four phases: 1) storytelling and relationships to place; 2) embodied engagements with the environment; 3) site-specific performance creation; and, 4) a culminating communal meal using foraged Japanese knotweed and wild parsnips as the primary ingredients.

Fig. I Worried (2019) by Molly Valentine Dierks, Franconia Sculpture Park, Taylor Falls, MN (2021)