The Spillway
Lily Brooks
December 11-January 2, 2022
Opening: Saturday, December 11, 6:00 pm-10:00 pm

Since 2016, Lily Brooks has been working within the local landscape of the Bonnet Carre Spillway, visualizing the space as emblematic of global sites of extraction and environmental fragility. The 12-square miles of public land and 7000-foot flood control structure is managed by the Army Corps of Engineers and is designated for purposeful flooding during extreme conditions, protecting the levee system of the lower Mississippi River. Within this work Brooks consider’s the landscape’s complex and layered history – its violent legacy as a sugar plantation, proximity to petrochemical industry, current use as a site for recreation, and recent frequency of flooding. The resultant photographic and video works examine the way capitalism has shaped the landscape we inhabit and the histories we choose to tell amid institutional erasure and environmental violence.

Image: Lily Brooks – The Spillway