Bob Braine

Bob Braine built his first boat to explore the Bronx River in 1995. Since then, he has ventured along many of New York’s waterways to view the city from a pre-industrial perspective. He is particularly interested in the ecology of the urban edges where industry and nature meet and the residue of consumption culture accumulates. He examines botanical and animal life as a metaphor for the power of biology and growth of mutant nature. In these marginal places he studies the cultural human activity, topography, and the pre-Hudsonian history of place. The Harlem Duck Boat video and still photographs document his trip along the Harlem River on January 15, 2000. The boat is camouflaged with trash, making it easy to maneuver “surreptitiously along the refuse-strewn shorelines of our great metropolis.” For the Halletts Cove project at Socrates Sculpture Park, he created a boat from debris to explore the area. The infrared aerial photograph indicates the wildlife and cultural activity found in this edge site.

Links

http://www.tamron.com/galleries/braine/gallery.asp