soil testing, 2026

glass jars, soil from Juana Simona (living laboratory), sagebrush, thread, roots, corn husk, soap and water

In the first stage of reintroducing native plants at Juana Simona, my living laboratory in South Texas and the ancestral land of the Carrizo-Comecrudo, soil samples were gathered to study soil composition.  The area has become a thorny forest due to the extractive ranching practices of cattle grazing introduced by Spaniard colonizers which incorporated the mesquite tree.  Once the floor of the Gulf of Mexico which then turned into grasslands, the soil contains sand, some silt and clay.  At the start of the process, the small terrariums mirror the our current monoculture farming landscape with its rigid horizon line. Small openings to the lids introduced air and other microbes into the soil testing.  A range of colors and figures emerged from its growing culture inside the glass.  The formations of trees with clouded skies made the soil samples alive and in constant change.