Fair River, Falling Banks

with Shaun Slifer
2006

Shaun Slifer and I began collaboration through email and post in late 2005, soon after I took up temporary residence in Sangklaburi, Thailand. Influences included rivers, story-telling, international borders and the nature of water as it moves through these various constructions. We collected skipping stones from various rivers along our travels and mailed them to each other, each of us skipping our imported stones over the waters of a new river across the planet from the last.

Skipping stones were traded between:
Mississippi River, Memphis, Tennessee, USA
Tonle Sap, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
Ohio River, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA
Songkalia, Sangklaburi, Thailand
Rogue RIver, Oregon, USA
Mae Nam Ping, Chiang Mai, Thailand
Cumberland River, Nashville, Tennessee, USA
Nam Khan, Laung Prabang, Laos
San Jose River, Utah, USA
Mekong, Vientaine, Laos
Youghiagheny River, Pennsylvania, USA

For an installation in October, 2006, we collected water from the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers, which intersect in downtown Pittsburgh to form the Ohio River. These samples were then run through slow drip lines positioned over stones from the Mae Nam Ping (Chiang Mai, Thailand) and Rogue River (Oregon, USA). The resulting drips splashed against a large sheet of vellum which bore drawings of the fictionalized intersections of these two rivers with Pittsburgh's aforementioned ones. The ink from the drawing slowly leeched and mixed together while the accumulated water made miniscule patterns in a mixture of sand and diatomaceous earth below. When the installation ran it's course, the sample stones were skipped in the corresponding local rivers.