PARTICIPATION GUIDE

CONTENTS

An Introduction to Engaging Moth Garden

A Flowery Description of Moth Garden

An audio version of the description

Participation Scores

Introduction: A Sensory Experience

by Lisa Hirmer

Moth Garden is a project about senses. It is a place to reach across species limits and consider the sensory worlds of other beings. We, the artists, are sighted, trichromat* humans. We created Moth Garden with an awareness that every species has its own unique sensory world, shaped by their evolution and physiology. We made it to be a place that decentres human understandings of the world and reminds visitors that the senses of a human body are just one way to experience the world. At the same time, we acknowledge that within the spectrum of possibility created by our species-bodies, every individual has their own unique sensory experiences too and that there are as many ways of being in a human body as there are humans. We love that there are innumerable ways to experience the garden during the day or night.

Moth Garden is a place where everyone can consider what senses they use most in everyday life and take time to attune themselves to senses that have become fainter. In a world that privileges sight and drenches the nighttime world in artificial light, the garden offers a dark, nighttime space that each visitor can explore in whatever ways are accessible to them. We hope it is an experience that sparks a sense of wonder at all the ways of sensing that are possible in this world, whether it is you the feeling the soft hum of a moth flying by, watching moths navigating the world by scent, or noticing the sonic landscape of bats as they fly overhead.

*trichomats see blue, green and red light, unlike people with colour blindness who see fewer. 

A Flowery Description of Moth Garden

by Christina Kingsbury

Moth Garden sits on the crest of a hill, surrounded by cultivated fields that stretch far to the north and east. Beyond the fields on the southeast side, a Cedar forest slopes down to an open wetland bisected by a small rewilding stream. A mowed path and walking trail traveling east-west along the crest of the hill brings you to the entrance of Moth Garden, which opens up from the north side of the path.  A large black walnut tree grows across the mowed path south of the garden, whose refreshing shade laps at the garden entrance in the morning light. 

As you enter the garden space, you are enveloped by a crescent moon shaped bed of plants – referencing the mysterious relationship moths have with the moon. The crescent moon garden bed is surrounded by an outer ring of shrubs and plants that were planted just beyond a wide mulch pathway that circles the garden. 

The crescent moon hugs a circular patch of mowed Wild Strawberry and Yarrow plants that grow low to the ground. This is meant as a place to rest, to sit or stand or lie in the garden on a dark night or a warm sunny day.

In the springtime, the Wild Strawberries fill this patch with tiny white blossoms, while nearby the blushing pink and yellow Wild Columbine flowers dangle and shrubs like Elderberry and New Jersey Tea are dotted with foamy white umbels of flowers. Painted Lady caterpillars can be found munching on the soft silvery-green wooly leaves of Pearly Everlasting that emerge from the earth.

In the summer months, the garden comes into full swing as the crescent moon comes aglow with waves of white and purple blossoms that glow on a late summer moonlit night. Plants stretch overhead into the sky. In the early summer, the pea-like blossoms of Wild Lupin and Wild Indigo dot the garden with purple-blue and white, as dainty maeve Harebells quiver in the breeze and the prolific tubular blooms of Foxglove Beardtongue create a sea of white. The heady fragrance of pinky clusters of Common Milkweed fill the air, attracting a bustle of moths at night, and butterflies, bees and beetles that cloud the plants during the day. 

Mid-summer leaves the minty fragrance of Mountain Mint and Wild Bergamot on skin that reaches out to caress soft leaves and stems covered with a sea of white and pastel purple. In the nighttime, UV lights find fuzzy fluorescent balls of bumble bees sleeping in the dramatic purple spikes of Blazing Star, and the tall white candelabra-like wands of Culver’s Root are clustered with nectar drinking moths. 

In the fall, all shades of small purple, blue and white Aster blooms spread across the garden. Plant leaves and stems turn brassy and the breeze begins to lift airborne parachutes of blossoms turned to seed by the magic of pollinating creatures.    

Participation Scores

Being in the Dark by Lisa Hirmer

Moth Garden is a place where you can take some time to think about your own senses. Which ones do you use most in day to day life? Which ones do you use very little? One way you might do this is by spending some time in the dark. Find a comfortable place in the garden, turn off any lights you have and just observe what happens to your senses. How do they change? Are there some you notice more? Are there any that become less prominent?

Experiments with Light by Lisa Hirmer

Moth Garden is also a place where you can experiment with lights of different colours. If you have a flashlight or other source of light, turn it on. What do you notice? How does it affect the moths? Try to be mindful that this might disorient them and keep the light exposure brief. Next, if you have a UV light, try experimenting with that. Humans cannot see the UV part of the light spectrum, but most moths can (any purple light you see from the UV light is only a portion of what is being emitted). Again be mindful that this light can be disorienting to moths (and also should not be directed at human eyes) We recommend shining it onto flowers, so that the light helps the moths find them. What changes under this type of light? How do the moths behave in the presence of this kind of light? Do things look, sound or feel different? Then if you can, try out a red light (most headlamps and camping lights have this feature). Do you notice a difference? While many humans see red light, most moths do not, which means the red light will be less disruptive to them. How does this change the moths’ behaviour? How does it change what you perceive? You can take more time observing moths with the red light, as it is less disruptive to the moths and gentler on human eyes.

With gratitude to Aislinn Thomas, Greg Clarke and Moira Williams for their advice on our participation guide and project access.

And with gratitude to Canada Council for the Arts and ParkPeople for their support of access at Moth Garden