The Wisconsin Project: Found: Rib Mountain State Park, Wausau, WI

5.10.14

Found: Rib Mountain State Park, Wausau, WI

Found: Near Summit of Rib Mountain State Park, Wausau, Wis. Highest Point in Wisconsin, Elevation 1940 feet.
"The summit of Rib Mountain is 1940 feet above sea level, about 700 feet higher than the city of Wausau.
The original park land consisted of 40 acres donated by Jacob Gensman Estate April 17, 1932.
February 19, 1923, the Kiwanis Club donated an additional 120 acres and
early in 1933 the State "purchased" another 120 acres, thus forming a State Park comprising 280 acres."
Natural Color Post Card Made in U.S.A. by E. C. Kropp Co., Milwaukee, Wis. Circa 1949.

The text of this card attracted us initially with the sign directing visitors to "keep to the left" on their way to the "highest point" in Wisconsin. Rib Mountain is not the highest point in Wisconsin though it is the highest mountain or hill at 1942 feet (not 1940 as this text claims). NOTE: Timms Hill (near Tomahawk, WI) is in fact the highest natural point at 1951.5 feet. The park claims to be one of the first ski resorts in the US having opened in 1937 and still operates as Granite Peak resort with 75 runs. Local legend claims that besides Paul Bunyan forming the Grand Canyon and the Mississippi River, that his burial alongside Babe the Blue Ox formed Rib Mountain. But this is a claim that can't be disproven through accurate measuring.

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THE WISCONSIN PROJECT

Our research-driven Wisconsin Project contemplates the rooted-ness and state-of-mind resulting from inhabiting a single place, our native Wisconsin, for a long time. Through critiquing postcard views both made and found, we learn a great deal about past and present Wisconsin. We began making postcard views of the places immediately around our studio and on our drives around Wisconsin in about 2008. We use the vintage postcard film format and print the cards in palladium and cyanotype. By communicating details of a specific place, seeming to register only marginally on the national radar, the project seeks to bring audiences into a Wisconsin mental space. Some in the art world would argue that the Midwest, particularly Wisconsin, makes for banal “fly over” subject matter. Our project challenges that by finding meaning in the ordinary and inviting audiences to examine, dialog, and reflect on the particular emotional quality of the idiosyncrasies of place and the perceptions of those both inside and outside of it. Sometimes distant memories are involved and a longing for a time now gone. Wisconsin’s glacier inflected landscape and proximity to the Great Lakes creates an exotic arena for living that informs our project. The life cycle plays out and rural and urban ruins serve as monuments to existences as people, places, and ideas surface then vanish. Ultimately, we aim to grapple with complex perceptions of Wisconsin ranging from nostalgic, romantic, and idealized--as depicted on myriad real photo postcard and standard tourist postcards--to mysterious, dark, and Gothic as conveyed in works of art and literature such as Michael Lesy's "Wisconsin Death Trip" book and Werner Herzog's "Stroszek" film. The project culminated in a residency with workshops and community collaborations and the installation "We Go From Where We Know" at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center 10.13.2013-3.7.2014 and later the Harvestore Bandshell for Fermentation Fest in 10.2014. The blog continues the exploration of postcards.