Even The Trees Migrate

A public art installation project looking at the overlap between immigration, threats to our climate, and Indigenous Ecological Knowledge (IEK) inspired by the mycorrhizal networks as models for systems of care.

Even The Trees Migrate

Even The Trees Migrate is a public art installation project looking at the overlap between immigration, threats to our climate, and Indigenous Ecological Knowledge (IEK). Indigenous communities, the caretakers of these lands we call California have symbiotic relationships with the surrounding environment have noticed that oak trees have begun migrating because of rising temperatures. The decline of specific oak trees in areas they have grown for hundreds of years results in loss of habitat for other living beings and that impacts us all.

But oak trees form these mycorrhizal networks to communicate through fungi with other plants and living beings and learn collectively how to survive. In short, oak trees are recoding their seeds (acorns) to grow in hotter climates and are relying on birds and squirrels to do what they do and take those acorns to a better climate.

We are now seeing oak trees grow in areas where they didn’t previously grow. Some oak trees are migrating south along the coast, others are moving north because of the negative impacts humans are causing. Even The Trees Migrate signals that white supremacy and capitalism disrupt movement for the sake of profit. Migration is natural, migration is needed, migration is just.