A Ceramic Solution

Joining the network this week will be students from the California College of the Arts, here to share their story and process as collaborators in a unique design challenge: to design, build and deploy nest modules for breeding Rhinoceros Auklets on Año Nuevo Island.

The design criteria is extensive and nuanced, but the basics include:

• Use of responsible materials that degrade to cause little or no harm to the island or ocean
• A life span of 15+ years, a vast improvement over wooden boxes currently in use
• Assurance of bird safety (avoid becoming a physical or thermal trap)
• Biologist access to nest cavity, offset from nest if possible
• Transportability by zodiac boat and by hand
• Structural integrity to withstand weight of sea lions on soil above

The Design Ecology course, instructed by CCA's Head of Ceramics, Nathan Lynch, and Rebar's Matthew Passmore, offers a unique, hands-on opportunity for students from many creative disciplines to contribute an applied design solution that will help fulfill Oikonos' mission to rebuild seabird habitat on Año Nuevo Island.

While primarily a design studio anchored in the Ceramics Department, the course also encourages consideration of the following questions:

• What is the role of the artist, designer, or architect in structuring and mediating our conception of the "natural" world in general, and "restoration ecology" in particular?
• How should design interventions in the "natural" landscape be evaluated? Should an intervention based upon a conservation or restoration ecology be valued differently than an intervention based upon commercial imperatives? If so, how and why?
• What are the long-term implications of continuing or expanding human interventions into "natural" ecosystems?

By examining these questions in the context of an ongoing restoration ecology project, we hope to generate experience and perspectives that will further dialogue and collaboration between artists and scientists, and in this case, to produce successful, creative solutions to a particular habitat restoration challenge.

You're invited to follow the Design Ecology course and the process of producing ceramic nest modules in the students' blogs and the Photo Gallery.