"a haunted botany: a performance for a forgotten forest" focuses on the Eastern White Pine, an evergreen that once towered across the Northeast, growing as large as Sequoias. For the Wabanaki, it offered medicine, food, and shelter. For the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, it stood as the “Tree of Peace,” a symbol of unity among nations long before European contact.

By the late 1600s, the British Crown laid claim to the tallest trees, marking them with the “King’s Broad Arrow” to reserve them for Royal Navy masts. These seizures sparked colonial unrest—first in the Mast Tree Riot of 1734, then the Pine Tree Riot of 1772—precursors to the Boston Tea Party. The pine became a settler symbol, etched onto coins, stitched into flags, and built into homes as quiet acts of defiance. In more recent years, it has been resurrected by white nationalist movements, its meaning twisted and unmoored. Once stretching from Georgia to Manitoba, Eastern White Pine forests were nearly erased; today, less than 1% of old growth remains.