Digger bees have little cultural significance in our society: there are no stories, songs, or myths about these unfamiliar insects. Using methodologies that rely on community participation, artist and biologist Amy Lambert generated data on the bees in the Presidio and concurrently brought the digger bee into our consciousness. These newly created “stories” about the bees were manifest in the inscribed wax pollen ball forms that Lambert situated among plants at the Presidio’s native plant nursery.
- Installation Views
Amy Lambert, Pollen Balls Project, 2010 (detail); photo: Monique Deschaines
Amy Lambert, Pollen Balls Project, 2010 (installation view); photo: Monique Deschaines
Amy Lambert, Pollen Balls Project, 2010 (installation view); photo: Monique Deschaines
Amy Lambert, Pollen Balls Project, 2010 (detail); photo: Monique Deschaines
Amy Lambert, Pollen Balls Project, 2010 (installation view); photo: Monique Deschaines
Amy Lambert, Pollen Balls Project, 2010 (installation view); photo: Monique Deschaines
Amy Lambert, Pollen Balls Project, 2010 (detail); photo: Monique Deschaines
Amy Lambert, Pollen Balls Project, 2010 (installation view); photo: Monique Deschaines
Amy Lambert, Pollen Balls Project, 2010 (installation view); photo: Monique Deschaines
Amy Lambert is an environmental artist and restoration ecologist. In addition to carrying out ongoing field research in ecology, Lambert teaches at the University of Washington, where students in her art and restoration classes reclaim wilderness areas from invasive species and create artwork with the waste materials produced in order to visually engage the public in habitat restoration activity.