Forest One by Annie Ross

For about two months this spring, Annie Ross’ amazing Forest One – a full-size, 1956 Nash Metropolitan automobile that the artist has wrapped, twined, and plaited with cedar-bark, plastic strapping tape, and old wool yarn – will be displayed in all its woven glory in MOA’s Great Hall. Using bark salvaged from clear-cut urban forests, Dr. Ross, a weaver and Assistant Professor in First Nations Studies at Simon Fraser University, completely transformed the car inside and out. Forest One speaks of colonization, urban sprawl, trash, and remediating the urban landscape through acts of salvage.

Forest One is part of a larger art series by Annie Ross, supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (Research and Creation in the Fine Arts).

Annie Ross is the daughter of a Maya weaver and mixed-blood father. Her education began at home with plants, animals, art, handwork, storytelling, and history in Compton, California. Formal training followed in studio art, art history, ethnology, and folklore. Dr. Ross describes her practice as bringing craft as a transformative act to her teaching, research, and artwork. She learned weaving first from her mother, and then from other aboriginal weavers in the American west: Eunice Neseth (Aleut, of Kodiak Island, Alaska), Chief Janice George (Squamish), Bernadine Johns (Colville, Washington), and Tiny Valentine (Hopi, of Arizona). She has also worked with the Kodiak Area Native Association, museums, art galleries, the Institute of American Indian Arts, the University of California, and SFU.