Artists Make New York

We took a sit at Newtown Creek with Greater New York artist Alan Michelson to talk about what’s missing from the landscape. Four hundred years ago, monumental shell mounds—or middens—dotted this land (some dating as far back as 6950 BCE!). Alan’s installation, Midden, pays homage to Lenapehoking, the ancestral Lenape homelands, and its bounty of oysters, which fed generations until pollution made them unsafe to eat and decimated the oyster population. Alan collaborated with the Billion Oyster Project to source three tons of oyster shells (!) for his installation.