'State' of the Park; State of the Project

As any of the estimated thousand or so of you who were kind enough to stop by to participate in "The End: A Party" last Friday evening, March 31, 2006, now know -- and hey, thanks to all of you for stopping by -- the Not A Cornfield project on the grounds of the Los Angeles State Historic Park has concluded. The black mass pictured here is approx. 80 miles of irrigration tape used in the field, now awaiting deployment in possible future exhibitions documenting the project.

Questions about the 32-acre site popularly known as "The Cornfield" ought to be addressed to our friends and colleagues at California State Parks.

Our understanding -- and again, please confirm these details for yourselves -- is that work will soon begin on creating a 14-acre I.P.U -- interim park use -- State park on the grounds.

The State Park Foundation's Design Competition RFQ deadline is approaching; that competition is towards the ultimate plan of building a park to fill the entire grounds.

Meanwhile, Not A Cornfield, LLC is temporarily headquartered in a warehouse space across the street from the Park, at 1745 Baker Street #4. Call this blog wistful, but the portable trailer that housed the project's offices was trucked away yesterday. Ahh, instant nostalgia.

Visits to the new office can be arranged. Per usual, email the project or call the office phone number. PSI-ARC student groups popped in today.

Audio Documentary now online as a Podcast

The group Radiosonideros (Adolfo Guzmán López, Sara Harris, and Keren Ness) have created "The Roots of the Park", an evocative, informative, and captivating two hour audio documentary about past, present, and future of the Cornfield. Subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or download individual episodes here:

Episode 1: The Earth
Episode 2: The People, the Water, and the Rails
Episode 3: The People to the East
Episode 4: The Struggle for the Park: A View from Chinatown
Episode 5: The Food
Episode 6: The People to the West
Episode 7: Visions for the Park

Stay tuned for information regarding the purchase of a CD-quality copy of this documentary as well as photos and bags of corn from the project.

Hydroseeding, Easement, Monument Among Project "Leave-Behinds"

The Not A Cornfield project has concluded on the grounds of the Los Angeles State Historic Park.

In addition to well-chronicled infrastructure donations, and in addition to the art action's legacy -- however you, blog readers, choose to define that -- Not A Cornfield has also contributed the following "Leave Behinds" to the Park, and to the community:
* A hydroseeded field of native and drought tolerant plants appropriate to the Southern California climate, spread over the 18 acres of the site that are not part of the State Park I.P.U. The seed mix includes White Yarrow, California Poppy, Golden Yarrow, Bush Sunflower, Biglow’s Coreopsis and more.
* An upgraded and hydroseeded city easement – which is the newly landscaped and likewise recently planted area just east of the Park’s fenceline, on City of Los Angeles-owned property.
* ‘Cornhenge,' an anabolic monument, composed in part of 31 bales culled from the Not A Cornfield harvest and located on the north side of the site, away from the State Parks I.P.U. The monument is hydroseeded with a plant mix similar to the above, including White Yarrow, California Poppy, Golden Yarrow, Bush Sunflower and more.
Not A Cornfield was a metabolic sculpture. Comprised of earth, seed, water, sun and labor, the work harnessed and highlighted the chemical processes that are necessary to maintain life. Metabolic processes can lead to either destructive (catabolic) or constructive (anabolic) tissue change. ‘Cornhenge’ is an ‘anabolic monument,’ a monument to constructive change that is itself the product of constructive change. It is, in other words, an anabolic product of the metabolic whole.