. . . the sky is darkening . . . coming home . . .

This installation references the extinction through hunting of the Passenger Pigeon—a bird once so numerous in North America that its migrating flocks would sometimes blot out the sun for days. The photographic panels of the work show specimens from the Cornell’s Lab of Ornithology. The work addresses not only the extinction of the passenger pigeon but also the species of tree it favored, a majestic variety of American Chestnut effectively wiped out by an insect-borne fungal blight accidentally introduced by Japanese chestnut trees around 1900.

The beaded birds here celebrate the practice of Haudenosaunee beadwork—a hallmark of their culture and economic resilience for centuries. Each beaded bird is made by a different Haudenosaunee beadwork artist; as such, each represents a distinct family line and personal style. The six birds stand for the six nations of the confederacy.

Since the last passenger pigeon died in 1914, Haudenosaunee social dances were expanded to include a commemorative pigeon dance, acknowledging loss and the cyclical nature of life, but also indicating the bird’s resilience in collective memory. In Rickard’s work, this commemoration connects to both the eighteenth century dispossession of the Gayogo̱hó:nǫ (Cayuga) people at the hands of the Colonial government, and the current reclamation of and return to Gayogo̱hó:nǫ ancestral lands.

(Text by Andrew C. Weislogel for the exhibition “Art and Environmental Struggle,” presented at the Johnson Museum August 26–December 14, 2021.)