| In November, 2004, Jane Wolff was
invited to present her remarkable work about the California Delta
at the Center’s exhibit space in Los Angeles, as part of
the Center’s Independent Interpreters series of lectures
and presentations.
Ms. Wolff has studied this vital, mysterious, and often overlooked
part of the Californian landscape more than anyone else we know,
and she has presented her findings in an unusual and engaging
format.
The largest estuary on the west coast, the Delta is the lowlands
of the Central Valley, where the Sacramento River meanders towards
the San Francisco Bay area. It is a totally engineered land, much
of it below sea level, preserved by a precarious system of levees.
It is a land of hidden rural Chinatowns, monolithic agriculture,
heavy recreational boating, and nearly bayou-like backwaters.
All of this is captured and distilled by Jane Wolff’s trained
eye and hand.
After studying the region for at least seven years, making numerous
visits, she has chosen to depict the Delta, and the issues it
faces, as a set of drawings of selected sites, combined with the
site’s related USGS map, and a spare but lucid bit of text.
The renderings of place are grouped into four categories, and
ranked, becoming a set of playing cards.
These cards, as well as electronic versions of her drawings, maps,
and photographs, were shown at the CLUI over the period of the
exhibit. Ms. Wolff also came and gave a presentation of this work,
to a full and grateful audience at the CLUI.
The work is available as a book, published by the meticulous
and selective William Stout Publishers of San Francisco, with
a preface by the literate and prolific State Librarian, Kevin
Starr.
The project is also available in its purest form, as a set of
playing cards, which is perhaps the best way to experience it,
as a multitude of orderings and juxtapositions are created, depending
how it is played.
The Center's Independent Interpreter series of lectures and
presntations is
supported by a grant from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual
Arts.
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