Alyssa Enriquez
• cyanotype, birch charcoal, birch ink and birch board •
For my dear friend, Justin Germann
“In the boreal forests there is reason to hope…” –David George Haskell
A happenstance connection brought a beautiful birch tree into my life.
This birch tree has come to mean so much more than words could ever express. It stands tall and limber. Though quiet, an autumn breeze moved through its branches last fall, revealing a familiar gentleness, and in that moment, the forest felt like home.
The story of Justin’s tree began in 2010 when Watershed Elementary students planted birch seedlings to study how growing season length affects tree growth. Their experiment led to the Generation OneTree Alaska Research Garden, where university and K-12 students, teachers, and community members continue to collect data. A row of boundary trees surrounds it, where Justin’s tree stands, providing equal shading and wind protection to the research trees inside the plot. Justin’s tree is one of 26 adopted during the inaugural year of OneTree Alaska’s Tree Steward Program.
Justin’s tree carries the thoughts of Justin’s many friends, co-workers, and family who have visited the plot and his tree in 2023 and 2024.
For this collaborative piece, Jan Dawe lent her insights and reverence for all things birch, providing space for contemplative and meaningful creation in the OneTree STEAM Studio at UAF. With researcher and friend to Justin, Marc Oggier, Jan Dawe, and I explored making artist charcoal from branches gathered from Justin’s tree—a lengthy process based on inquiry and a bit of alchemy. This charcoal went from branch to ink. Marc documented the process through a journal entry written and sketched with the ink we made from Justin’s tree. I was interested in revisiting a process that has always brought me joy, the cyanotype, a historic photographic process—and a nod to Justin’s fondness for botany and the natural world.
ALYSSA ENRIQUEZ
Alyssa Enriquez is a photo-based artist and arts educator residing in Fairbanks, Alaska. Alyssa completed her MFA in Photography at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and earned her BFA in Fine Art Photography from Academy of Art University in San Francisco, California. Her most recent work subtly investigates social ecology in the subarctic, through the utilization of historic photographic processes to create vignettes of place, the sublime, and human impact on the landscape.
Website: alyssaenriquez.com
