Photo: Xavier Gil
The project "The Forest of the Crosses" was born from the need to
externalize my feelings towards my villages forest burned by wildfire
started on july 26th 2015 in the town of Òdena. It is an intervention in
this forest next to
the natural parc of Montserrat.
This
work is a mourning ritual that occupies an area of four hectares
expressing personal feelings. It aims to be a tool for denunciation and
awareness towards forest management and climate change.
Shortly
after the fire I started the first sketches of what this intervention,
would be, the idea was to do a job that express my feelings at that time
and so the viewer could perceive.
After som testing, I
decided to perform the operation in an area near the road BP-1101 witch
goes from Manresa to Montserrat to make more visible the project and
share those feelings with the audience circulating on the road. The
first cross of this forest is built within the term Sant Salvador de
Guardiola and the rest of the operation in the town of El Bruc.
From the very beginning Ihad the interest and involvement of the local press (
Manresainfo ,and Regió7), shortly after the catalan press, then a France Press report catapulted the project in newspapers of half the planet.
Because
in our culture the "mourning rituals" usually last a year Iproposed I
my self to continuebuilding until the date of the anniversary of the
fire on july 26th 2016. I built the last cross in front of numerous
media, was 1293th cross, wich number matches the number of hectares
burned by this fire.
The Forest of the Crosses has
become a place of pilgrime ahere many visitors go there every week and
where artist have been inspired to carry out their projects.
we
filmed part of four features films, three shorts, half a dozen music
vídeos, performances, photo shoots with models, nigth photography
courses, the larger nigth giga-photo in history, guided tours for school
and university teachers, etc..
After the intervention
the news of the project has been published in nearly 500 media from
around the world. It occupies the cover of the European edition of
The Wall Street Journal,
has been published in prestigious journals such as the British Guardian
and Daily Mail. The US has published more than 120 media, 75 in China,
30 in Japan, 8 in Saudi Arabia, 6 in United Arab Emirates, 6 in Egipt
and in places like Palestine, Iraq, Yemen, Guinea or the Pacific island
of Guam.
The second phase of the project in terms of
replanting the Forest of the Crosses with vegetation that supports
better the effects of forest fires and global rising temperatures.
The
aesthetic, and mediatic, and awarener, riser potencial of this project
pushes us to export the project idea and the intention is to go to make a
similar intervention in those parts of the world where the problem of
deforestation is more pronounced.
Photo: Pep Jaumandreu
