Field Stations 2022

San Juan River Basin, Southwestern United States

Field Stations 2022 was a month-long place-based, immersive summer workshop that focused on exploring climate change in ecologically-critical places in the San Juan River Basin in the Southwestern United States. Participants learned to develop ecological literacy and broaden their understandings of interdisciplinary socio-ecological inquiry by using tools from across planning and design disciplines, the conservation social sciences, ecological arts and the environmental humanities.

Download the Workshop Report

Our Approach

Field Stations 2022: Rural Futures was crafted by an interdisciplinary group of collaborators originating in the architecture and design disciplines to form a program that fore-fronted how visual and design modes of thinking can aid an array of disciplinary approaches that address issues relating to climate change and resiliency.

The course used techniques such as scientific observation, data collection, drawing, photography, and GIS visualization methods, alongside examinations into historical records to address the transformation of landscapes at local, regional and global scales. Cross-disciplinary interactions with local and tribal communities, environmental science organizations, urban planners, ecologists, academics, and artists enriched these studies, and provided a multidimensional foundation for physically exploring the region and engaging with the historical and lived experiences of the people in the area.

Foundational Topics

  • Geology (deep time, Earth and atmosphere building, geology of the San Juan Mountains)
  • Ecology and natural sciences (hydrology, biology, soil science, forest health)
  • Climate change (environmental transformation and resilience, food, water and energy)
  • Systems thinking (interconnection, complexity, environmental education)
  • Landscape dynamics (language of landscape, land-use history and planning, architecture and climate)
  • Socio-cultural dynamics (politics, economics and political ecology, intersectional race, gender and class dynamics)
  • Fieldwork principles (ethics, data collection principles, drawing and visualization techniques, comprehension of core issues and stakeholders)
  • Synthesis + Communication (narrative and visualization for different audiences, strategies for implementation)

Project Development

Participants and faculty participated in daily activities to develop their own agenda for inquiry within the framework set by the program team. Each participant was asked to complete a project at the end of the workshop. The content and structure of the project was flexible, but aimed to reflect the integration of experience, knowledge and observations gained throughout the workshop. Projects entailed recording and monitoring local conditions, analyzing ecosystemic changes, questioning representational strategies, exploring the restoration of physical and environmental spaces associated with the workshop and establishing relationships with local actors. Participants who had developed a prior creative proposal or agenda for inquiry in the region of study were also able to pursue their own project. Those who did not have a prior project in the area were encouraged to create one during the workshop, either independently or in conjunction with local community partners.

Places

The 2022 Field Stations program took place in Northern New Mexico and Southern Colorado in the Southwest region of the United States. The Southwest is a complex interface of extreme geographical conditions, from high peaks and arid canyons to the basins and mesas that comprise the Colorado Plateau. The heart of this region gives rise to two major river systems: The Colorado flows west out of the Rocky Mountains and ultimately joins with the Pacific Ocean at the Gulf of California. The Rio Grande flows south from its headwaters in the San Juan range of the Rockies on its way to the Atlantic Ocean at the Gulf of Mexico. Together, they support vast ecosystems, irrigate extensive agricultural lands and supply water to millions of people.

Since time immemorial the region has served as the traditional territories and ancestral homelands of Indigenous Peoples, including the Diné (Navajo Nation), Núu-agha-tʉvʉ-pʉ̱ (Ute Nation), Apache, Southern Pueblo, Laguna and Zuni Peoples. Today it is home to the largest concentration of Indigenous Nations within the US. To view the homelands of Indigenous Peoples in this region, visit the Native Lands Map here.

Spanish settlers first traveled to the region in the 1500s, followed by the French and later U.S.-American settlers who arrived in large numbers to the Southern Rocky Mountains in the 1860s, attracted by mining and agricultural prospects. In the past fifty years the urban population of the Southwest has exploded, as diverse groups of people have moved into the region.

Between 1901 and 2016, the average temperature in the Southwest region has increased by 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit. The San Juan Mountain region in Colorado has warmed by 2 degrees Fahrenheit over the past 30 years, the fastest rate of climate change in the United States outside of Alaska. Effects of climate change in this region are now observed in the form of larger and more severe wildfires, prolonged drought, decreased snowpack, food and economic insecurity and increased risks to human health.1

1 Garfin, Gregg M., Patrick Gonzalez, David Breshears, Keely Brooks, Heidi E. Brown, Emile Elias, Amrith Gunasekara, et al. 2018. “Chapter 25: Southwest. Impacts, Risks, and Adaptation in the United States: The Fourth National Climate Assessment, Volume II.

From the Rio Grande to the San Juan Basin

Our studies began in Albuquerque, New Mexico’s largest city, which sits along the Rio Grande. From Albuquerque we traveled north over the Continental Divide and into the San Juan Basin, a watershed that feeds the Colorado River. The FS focused on the Animas River, a major tributary of the San Juan River that originates in the peaks around Silverton, Colorado. From Silverton the Animas flows south out of the mountains, through Durango, Colorado and on to agricultural lands around Farmington, New Mexico, where it joins the San Juan. The Farmington area is called Tótah by local Diné, meaning “between the waters” in recognition of its role as a life sustaining place.2

Within the San Juan watershed evidence of mineral and resource extraction industries is always close by. Commercial mining beginning in the 19th century transformed the Southwest into an important hub for extraction and energy projects. These activities both facilitated the forced removal and dispossession of Indigenous peoples and caused ongoing environmental degradation.3 Uranium mining, coal-fired power plants and oil and natural gas have produced boom economies, while inflicting disproportionate community health impacts and economic instability. The region now faces a shift as some coal-fired power plants are slated for closure and oil and gas industries have moved to other fields.4

2 Teresa Montoya. 2016. “Tó Łisto / Yellow Water.” Ethnographic Terminalia.
3 Jonathan Thompson. 2018. “The Dark Secrets of the Animas River.” High Country News, May 28, 2018.
4 Jonathan Thompson. 2019. “New Mexico’s ‘mini’ Green New Deal, Dissected.” High Country News, March 25, 2019.

Itinerary

June 1-3 – Introduction

  • Albuquerque, NM (alt. 5,312 ft)
  • Rio Grande Watershed

Context

  • Key fieldwork strategies
  • Workshops with local leaders
  • Introduction to geology and water

June 3-10 – Transect

  • Albuquerque, NM (alt. 5,312 ft)
  • to Cortez, CO (alt. 6,191 ft)
  • Rio Grande to San Juan Watershed

Observation

  • Local ecosystems
  • Cultural sites and projects
  • Introduction to study sites

June 10-18 – Core Studies

  • Durango, CO (alt. 6,522 ft)
  • San Juan Watershed

Argument

  • Fieldwork
  • Classroom work
  • Study visits to nearby landscapes, towns and areas of environmental transition

June 18-22 – Core Studies

Silverton, CO (alt. 9,318 ft)

  • Alpine ecosystems

June 22-30 – Conclusion

  • Delores, CO (alt. 6,936 ft)
  • Durango, CO (alt. 6,522 ft)
  • San Juan Watershed

Synthesis

  • Individual projects
  • Visualization and communication
  • Exhibit for Field Stations 2022

People

Course Leaders

Frida Foberg (Program Manager, Field Stations) is a Swedish community-oriented artist, architect and educator based in New York. She holds an MA in Architecture from Aarhus School of Architecture. Her work unfolds the space that flows between individuals and their contexts. By working with spatial elements encouraging interaction and reflection, she poses questions that explore the notion of self and others. Frida has served as the associate director of the non profit arts and education organization Arts Letters & Numbers where she worked with UNICEF, China Academy of Fine Art, Cooper Union, Big Picture Learning, Art Council Korea, Education Reimagined, Iowa State University, National Coalition Building Institute, and Youth fx, to develop interdisciplinary programs, creating a platform to rethink and expand the field of architecture, education and social awareness. Frida works actively with communities and organizations, holding space for the multitude of voices and their interactions.
Kevin Bone (Program Director, 2020 & 2022 Field Stations) was a professor of architecture at the Cooper Union from 1985 through 2018, teaching design, building technology and sustainability. During his time at Cooper he worked to integrate issues of environment into the curriculum and was the founding director of the Cooper Union Institute for Sustainable Design. Bone has published on architecture, infrastructure, energy and landscape. Those publications include; Lessons From Modernism, Environmental Design Considerations in Architecture, 1925-1970; The New York Waterfront, Evolution of the Port and Harbor; and Water-Works, the Architecture and Engineering of the New York City Water Supply. Bone is also a principal at Bone/Levine Architects. The practice works in architectural design, technical consulting and historic preservation. Bone has worked with the Wright-Ingraham Institute to develop small scale, experimental, educational initiatives including its Field Stations program.
Margaux Wheelock-Shew (Educational Associate, Field Stations) is an educator and designer based out of Massachusetts. She is currently pursuing her Masters of Architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, focusing on the rethinking of typology through a sociohistorical context. Before that, she spent several years working at Diller Scofidio and Renfro in New York City. Her undergraduate thesis at the Cooper Union focused on rethinking the social landscapes of labor. There, she pursued a research fellowship to examine the link between the anthropocenic desire for oil, water, and land in the former alluvial flood plains in Kern Country, California. She has taught courses in architecture at the Cooper Union and as an ACE mentor to NYC public high school students.

Faculty

Jake Kurzweil, PhD is an ecohydrologist and the Associate Director of Water Programs at Mountain Studies Institute. His research focuses on creating climate resilient ecosystems and water supplies. Jake received his B.S. from the University of Oregon in both Environmental Science and Sociology and shortly after began a career in environmental stewardship. Jake worked as a science educator, ornithologist, and natural resource program manager before returning for his master’s and PhD in Hydrologic Science and Engineering at Colorado School of Mines (Mines). Jake's research has included creating and implementing monitoring protocols for freshwater springs, understanding the observed hydrologic response to wildfire mitigation, and modeling possible impacts of climate and forest change on hydrologic systems. Jake has expertise in watershed and snow science, statistical analysis, computer modeling, geospatial and remote sensing analysis, and wetland ecology. Jake is also incredibly passionate about community outreach and STEM education. Jake is currently an adjunct professor at Fort Lewis College teaching Environmental Studies.
Marcie Bidwell serves as Executive Director and landscape ecologist for Mountain Studies Institute. She has a Master of Landscape Architecture degree from University of Washington with a specialty in learning landscapes and community restoration. Marcie considers herself a hybrid designer-scientist working to infuse community collaborations with design thinking. She has eighteen years of leadership experience in natural resource management, climate adaptation, environmental science, and program development to achieve watershed health and environmental justice. Throughout her diverse professional experience, Marcie has worked with scientists and citizens to manage, design, and facilitate community-based projects for the restoration and management of public and private lands. Marcie is adept at integrating scientific findings into educational programs, natural resource management and decision making.
Katrina Blair began studying wild plants in her teens when she camped out alone for a summer to embrace a wild foods diet. She later wrote "The Wild Edible and Medicinal Plants of the San Juan Mountains" for her senior project at Colorado College. She completed a MA at John F Kennedy University in Orinda, CA in Holistic Health Education. She founded Turtle Lake Refuge in 1998, a non-profit whose mission is to celebrate the connection between personal health and wild lands. Turtle Lake Refuge includes a wild local living foods café, sustainable education center and community farm. Katrina teaches permaculture and wild edible and medicinal classes locally and globally. She is author of several books including: Local Wild Life - Turtle Lake Refuge Recipes for Living Deep and The Wild Wisdom of Weeds: 13 Essential Plants for Human Survival.
Rebecca Clausen is a professor of Sociology and Human Services at Fort Lewis College. She is also an affiliate faculty member in the Environmental Studies Program. She joined the college in 2008 from the University of Oregon, where she was a graduate teaching fellow in sociology and environmental studies. Clausen is an environmental sociologist whose research interests include the social drivers of environmental change, the political economy of global food systems, and marine fishery degradation. Her current research focuses on the social and emotional impacts of the 2015 Gold King Mine Spill to farming communities on the Navajo Nation. Dr. Clausen actively publishes her research in journals such as Sustainability and Society and Natural Resources. In 2015, Clausen co-authored and published The Tragedy of the Commodity: Oceans, Fisheries, and Aquaculture which contributed to defining a new field of Marine Sociology. She is a reviewer for several journals, including the American Sociological Review, Conservation Biology, and Sociology of Development.
Michael Ben-Eli is the founder of The Sustainability Laboratory, established in order to advance the concept of sustainability, expanding prospects and producing positive, life affirming impacts on people and ecosystems in all parts of the world. Prior to launching The Lab, Michael pioneered applications of systems thinking and cybernetics in management and organization, and has worked on synthesizing strategy issues in many parts of the world and in diverse institutional settings. Michael is the author of the widely-acclaimed five core sustainability principles, and he is leading development of The Lab as a worldwide network of ecozone-based activity centers. In 2016, Michael was inducted into the International Green Industry Hall of Fame and recognized with the organization’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
Kirk Gordon is a landscape architect and graphic designer with a background in plant biology and zoology. His work focuses on the relationships between ecological wisdom and new technologies in imagining resilient futures. Kirk received his Master of Landscape Architecture degree from the University of Virginia and currently works as a landscape designer at SCAPE Landscape Architecture in New York City. Kirk is an alumnus of the 2019 Field Stations workshop in Colombia.
Dr. Tim Haarmann is the ranch manager at the Banded Peak Ranch near Chromo, Colorado. Tim has over 20 years experience in natural resources management. He has a PhD from the University of New Mexico in Biology with an emphasis in Ecosystem Ecology. Before coming to the Banded Peak Ranch, Tim worked as Ranch Manager on the 89,000-acre Valles Caldera National Preserve in northern New Mexico. He also worked at Los Alamos National Laboratory and surrounding property as a resource manager responsible for projects in natural resources management and planning, wildlife management, and forest/fire management.
Dr. Ted Jojola Dr. Ted Jojola has a distinguished career as an educator and practitioner in urban and regional planning and other related subjects, with particular specialty in indigenous planning. Since 1980, he has taught at the University of New Mexico. He served as director of Native American Studies from 1980 to 1996, acting director of the Community and Regional Planning Program in 1995-96 and director in 2004-05. From 2007-2009, he was Visiting Distinguished Professor in the School of Geographic Sciences and Urban Planning at Arizona State University. In 2011, he founded the Indigenous Design and Planning Institute at UNM and is currently its Director. Jojola is actively involved in major research projects on Indian education, Indigenous community development and architecture. He is coeditor of two books—The Native American Philosophy of V.F. Cordova entitled How It Is (U. of Arizona Press, 2007) and Reclaiming Indigenous Planning (McGill-Queens University Press, 2013). A third book is in the works, Contemporary Indigenous Architecture: Local Traditions, Global Winds (working title, UNM Press). In addition, he has published numerous articles and chapters on topics relating to indigenous design & planning, stereotyping and economic development.
C. Kenneth Kassenbrock, MD, PhD, is an Emeritus Associate Professor of Biology at Colorado State University, where he taught classes in Mycology, Cell Biology, and Human Genetics. Trained as a physician-scientist, Dr. Kassenbrock did post-doctoral work in molecular genetics with the brewer’s yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae and worked in cellular signal transduction and cancer biology at the University of Colorado Medical Center before moving to CSU. At CSU, mycology moved from a long-held passion to a central career focus, and Dr. Kassenbrock continues to give invited presentations on a range of mycological topics to both university and public audiences.
Dr. Melinda Laituri is a professor emeritus of geography in the Department of Ecosystem Science and Sustainability at Colorado State University. She is the Founding Director of the Geospatial Centroid at CSU that provides support for geospatial research and teaching across the university. She is a Fulbright Scholar having taught GIS at the University of Botswana and conducted research in the Center for Scientific Research, Indigenous Knowledge, and Innovation on participatory mapping and conservation planning. Professor Laituri is a Rachel Carson Fellow for Environment and Society at the Ludwig Maximillian University, Munich. Laituri is a founding member of the Center for Environmental Justice. She is a visiting scientist at the Center for Geographic Analysis at Harvard University. Professor Laituri taught at CSU’s Mountain Campus – an in-residence, four-week, field-based, experiential learning course providing instruction on watershed science and field-data collection tools. She received her PhD from the University of Arizona in Geography and held a three-year tenure track position at University of Auckland, New Zealand before joining Colorado State University.
Charlotte Malterre-Barthes is an architect, urban designer, and Assistant Professor of Architectural and Urban Design at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL) where she leads the laboratory RIOT (Research and Intervention on Territory). Most recently Assistant Professor of Urban Design at the Harvard Graduate School of Design where she taught studios and seminars, she launched in 2021 the initiative ‘A Global Moratorium on New Construction’ interrogating current protocols of development, and urging for a deep reform of planning disciplines to face the climate and social emergency.
David W. Orr is Paul Sears Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and Politics Emeritus and senior advisor to the president of Oberlin College. He is a founding editor of the journal Solutions, and founder of the Oberlin Project, a collaborative effort of the city of Oberlin, Oberlin College, and private and institutional partners to improve the resilience, prosperity, and sustainability of Oberlin. While at Oberlin, he spearheaded the effort to design, fund, and build the Adam Joseph Lewis Center, which was named by an AIA panel in 2010 as “the most important green building of the past 30 years,” and as “one of 30 milestone buildings of the twentieth century” by the U.S. Department of Energy and was instrumental in funding the Peter B. Lewis Gateway Center. Orr is the author of eight books, including Dangerous Years: Climate Change, the Long Emergency, and the Way Forward (Yale, 2016) and Down to the Wire: Confronting Climate Collapse (Oxford, 2009) and coeditor of three others. He has authored over 200 articles, reviews, book chapters, and professional publications. In the past 25 years, he has served as a board member or advisor to eight foundations and on the boards of many organizations, including the Rocky Mountain Institute and the Aldo Leopold Foundation. Currently he is a trustee of the Alliance for Sustainable Colorado and the Children and Nature Network.
Emma Podietz recently graduated with a Masters in Landscape Architecture from the University of Maryland. Her research and professional interests include the integration of ecological science and landscape architecture. Her masters thesis focused on the application of ecological succession theory to the long-term design and management of urban parks and forests. Before earning her MLA, she studied art, environmental studies, Latin American studies, and Geographic Information Systems and worked in the bicycle industry for several years.
Chip Thomas, aka jetsonorama, is a photographer, public artist and physician who has been working in a small clinic on the Navajo Nation since 1987. There he coordinates the Painted Desert Project which he describes as a community building dialog which manifests as a constellation of murals painted by artists from the Navajo Nation as well as from around the world. Thomas’ own public artwork consists of enlarged black and white photographs pasted onto structures along the roadside primarily on the Navajo Nation. His motivation is to reflect back to the community the love they’ve shared with him over the years. Thomas was a 2018 Kindle Project gift recipient and in 2020 he was one of a handful of artists chosen by the UN to recognize the 75th anniversary of the UN’s founding. Selected artists are to generate work that contributes to the envisioning and shaping of a more resilient and sustainable future. The UN writes “...Right now we are facing the greatest health challenge to the human race in a century. COVID-19 has revealed that a virus can affect not only our physical health but also our ability to cope with the psychological impact in its wake.” Thomas spent 2021 working collaboratively to create art that is a community based in response to the pandemic.
Cliff Villa On the faculty of the University of New Mexico School of Law, Prof. Cliff Villa teaches and writes in the areas of constitutional rights, environmental law, and environmental justice. He also serves as a supervising attorney in the UNM clinical law program. Before joining UNM, Cliff spent more than 20 years as an EPA attorney, through offices in Washington, D.C., Denver, Colorado, and Seattle, Washington. Cliff is the author of a number of professional journal articles and the co-author of two textbooks: Environmental Justice: Law, Policy and Regulation (3rd ed. 2020); and A Practical Introduction to Environmental Law (2017). Born and raised in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Cliff graduated summa cum laude from UNM with a B.A. in English and economics and he received his J.D. from Lewis & Clark Law School in Portland, Oregon.
Chili Yazzie Chili is Diné from Shiprock, Navajo Nation. He served his community and the Navajo Nation for 45 years in various administrative and elective offices from the local level to the Navajo Nation central government level. He states his credentials as Grandpa, Farmer and Earth Defender. His life has been one of activism advocating for Indigenous civil and human rights. He works as Director with the TOOHNII BINANEESTˀĄˀ AŁTAASˀÉÍ ALLIANCE, Inc. (ToohBAA). Chili is greatly concerned with the health of our Earth Mother and the condition of the planet we leave our grandchildren into the future.

Participants

Hawa Amin-Arsala (she/her) is a former creative strategist dedicating a current selfstudy to rethink systems of institutional education around climate. She aims to rebuild her practice to foster ecological programs in the Bay Area and in Afghanistan.
Andrew Boyd (he/him) is a landscape architect and environmental planner, currently consulting several landmark projects throughout North America, with a focus in water resource allocation.
Luiza Coimbra de Oliveira (she/her) is a Brazilian architect and urbanist. She researches the concept of porosity as it applies to territorial dynamics in the natural and built environment.
Sunny Dooley (she/her) is a traditional Diné wisdom teacher, keeper, and teller. She explores current environmental changes through her traditional sense of holistic understanding and teaching.
Lia Griesser (she/they) is a graduate of Historic Preservation and Landscape Architecture at UNM interested in agro-ecological approaches to communal systems of land management.
Martine Johannessen (she/they) is a regional planning student at UC Berkeley who is pursuing a thesis on the intertwined economic socio-political roles that giant cane removal plays on the Rio Grande.
Simone Johnson (she/her) is an interdisciplinary artist, researcher and cultural worker mostly making work about water. She is currently researching water and time, particularly within the Colorado River Basin.
Chujin (Dina) Luo (she/her) is a graduate student from Shenzhen with a background in geography and water resources. She recently graduated from landscape architecture at UVA, where she researched the impacts of extraction.
Morgan E Vought (she/her) is a recent graduate of Harvard GSD in Landscape Architecture, focusing on the preservation of cultural identity through the identification of site-based networks.
Homaira Siddiqui (she/her) is a Senior Policy Advisor at the Ontario Ministry of Energy who seeks opportunities to better understand the on-the-ground impacts of policy in the Southwest, focused on the intersection of vulnerability, community, and energy.

Publications

2022 FIeld Stations Report
Banded Peaks Ranches – Wetland Restoration Study