Walking as Ontological Shifter > Walking: Activating the Senses~Expanding the Categories

A walk in the Queens Botanical Gardens for Open Engagement-2014

Threshold: what is it? from life to work, from self to world, from consciousness to non-consciousness, from sentient to inert matter, what separates one form or state from another? Walking in an urban garden created a more dynamic awareness of these liminal spaces. Walking was an opportunity to nourish our ability to perceive, aiming to find ways to become more attuned to how behaviors and habits are constituted.

The Queens Botanical Garden, established in 1939 as backdrop for the World’s Fair, has a little known history of intercultural and inter-species relations. It was also an early adaptor of urban farming, and other environmentally friendly activities. This history percolated to inform the transitions from perception and emotion to behavior and knowledge production.