Note: This post was written while Uclulet artist Carly Butler was in residence at the McLoughlin Gardens.
Carly Butler in the studio: “I brought a small press with me and set it up on the sturdy workbench and used the remaining tables for papermaking and type setting.”
It’s September 30th, Truth and Reconciliation Day, and I’m sitting enjoying the sunrise and the early morning wildlife as a settler at a settler’s cabin, both products of the 1970s. In fact, the wifi password here is the year I was born, which is a good reminder that this isn’t an ancient homestead, but belongs to an era of which I was part. Back in the mid 1970’s when these gardens were started and this home was built, no one thought much about the politics of plants, the invasiveness of species brought in from afar to ‘beautify’ the landscape (i.e. ‘make more European’). But the things we took for granted are no longer so, and much, if not all, of this new reckoning/reconsidering/reconciliation has occurred in my lifetime – which honestly, doesn’t feel that long. So it still feels tentative and uncertain, as does my work in this area. I came thinking that I would skewer George Fraser, plant hybridizer and occasional ‘eco terrorist’ in Ucluelet, but upon reading his letters, I started to like him. Yes, the letters are often dull lists of plants and seeds and descriptions of the weather, but he was a man passionate about gardening and growing, who cared about his friends, and who genuinely simply loved rhododendrons and wanted to take care of the land that he later called his ‘heaven on earth’. I think he actually would have been horrified to learn that he might have negatively disrupted the landscape and ecosystem. So, he’s a complicated figure. And in terms of the contracting of history, 8 years after his death, Queen Elizabeth took the throne – and I’m here using newspapers to light the woodstove that are reporting on her funeral that was just last week…
We are only beginning to scratch the surface of how to think about and articulate our own histories and preconceptions. It will be a while before we truly understand what it means to reconcile, never mind confront the truths of the past. In many ways the founders of this property, Sarah and Brian McLoughlin, were ahead of their time in understanding this. The generous act of gifting this property back to the town, to be enjoyed by the public and used by artists to create, think and learn, is a beautiful and tangible #landback action, removed from politics and publicity; just a simple act of humanity and respect. In Sarah McLoughlin’s own words:
“Our good friend, conservationist and activist Melda Buchanan, inspired us to remember that you never really own the land, you just take care of it.”