WEBVTT

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100 years ago,

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there were 2,000 varieties of peaches.

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Nearly 2,000 different
varieties of plums

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and almost 800 named varieties
of apples growing in the United States.

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Today only a fraction of those remain,

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and what is left is threatened
by industrialization of agriculture,

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disease and climate change.

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Those varieties that are threatened
include the Blood Cling,

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a red flesh peach brought my Spanish
missionaries to the Americas,

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then cultivated by Native
Americans for centuries.

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An apricot that was brought
by Chinese immigrants

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who came to work
on the Transcontinental Railroad.

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And countless varieties of plums
that originated in the Middle East

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and were then brought by Italian,
French and German immigrants.

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None of these varieties are indiginous.

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In fact, almost all of our fruit trees
were brought here,

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including apples and peaches and cherries.

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So more than just food,

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embedded within these fruits
is our culture.

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It's the people who cared for
and cultivated them,

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who valued them so much
that they brought them here with them

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as a connection to their home,

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and it's the way that they've passed
them on and shared them.

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In many ways, these fruit are our story.

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And I was fortunate enough to learn about

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through an artwork that I created
entitled "The Tree of 40 Fruit."

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"The Tree of 40 Fruit" is a single tree

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that grows 40 different
varieties of stone fruit.

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So that's peaches, plums, apricots,
nectarines and cherries

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all growing on one tree.

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It's designed to be a normal-looking tree
throughout the majority of the year

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until spring, when it blossoms
in pink and white

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and then in summer,
bears a multitude of different fruit.

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I began the project for purely
artistic reasons:

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I wanted to change
the reality of the everyday,

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and to be honest,

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create this startling moment
when people would see this tree

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and blossom in all these different colors

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and bear all of these different fruit.

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I create the tree of 40 fruit
through the process of grafting.

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I'll collect cuttings in winter,

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store them

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and then graft them onto
the ends of branches in spring.

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In fact, almost all fruit
trees are grafted

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because the seed of a fruit tree
is a genetic variant of the parent,

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so when we find a variety
that we really like,

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the way that we propagate it is by taking
a cutting off of one tree

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and putting it onto another,

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which is kind of crazy to think

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that every single Macintosh apple
came from one tree

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that's been grafted over and over
from generation to generation.

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But it also means that fruit trees
can't be preserved by seed.

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I've known about grafting
as long as I can remember.

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My great-grandfather made a living
grafting peach orchards

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in Southeastern Pennsylvania,

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and although I never met him,

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any time anyone would mention his name,

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they were quick to note

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that he knew how to graft as if he had
a magical or mystical capability.

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I decided on the number 40
for "The Tree of 40 Fruit"

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because it's found throughout
Western religion,

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it's not the quantifiable dozen

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and not the infinite,

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but a number that's beyond counting.

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It's a bounty, or a multitude.

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But the problem was that when I started,

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I couldn't find 40 different
varieties of these fruit,

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and this is despite the fact
that I live in New York state,

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which a century ago,

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was one of the leading
producers of these fruit.

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So as they were tearing out
research orchards

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and old, vintage orchards,

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I would collect branches off them

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and graft them onto trees in my nursery.

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So this is what the tree of 40 fruit look
like when they're first planted,

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and this is what they look like
six years later.

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This is definitely not a sport
of immediate gratification --

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(Laughter)

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It takes a year to know
if a graft has succeeded,

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it takes two to three years
to know if it produces fruit,

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and it takes up to eight years
to create just one of the trees.

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Each of the varieties grafted
to "The Tree of 40 Fruit"

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has a slightly different form
and a slightly different color.

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And I realized that by creating a timeline
of when all these blossomed

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in relationship to each other,

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I can essentially shape, or design
how the tree appears during spring.

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And this is how they appear during summer.

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They produce fruit from June
through September.

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First is cherries,

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then apricots,

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Asian plums,

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nectarines and peaches,

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and I think I forgot one
in there somewhere.

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(Laughter)

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Although it's an artwork that exists
outside of a gallery,

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as the project continues,

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it's been conservation by way
of the art world.

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As I've been asked to create these
in different locations,

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what I'll do is I'll research varieties

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that originated or historically
grown in that area,

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I'll source them locally and graft
them to the tree

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so that it becomes an agricultural history
of the area where they're located.

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And then the project got picked up online,

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which was horrifying and humbling.

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The horrifying part
was all of the tattoos that I saw

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of images of "The Tree of 40 Fruit."

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(Laughter)

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Which I was like, "Why would
you do that to your body?"

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(Laughter)

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And the humbling part
was all of the requests that I received

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from pastors, from rabbis and priests

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who asked to use the trees as a central
part within their service.

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And then it became a meme --

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and the answer to that question
is "I hope not?"

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(Laughter)

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Like all good memes,

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this is led to an interview
on NPR's "Weekend Edition."

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As a college professor,

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I thought I peaked --

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like that was the pinnacle
of my career --

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but you never know
who's listening to NPR ...

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and several weeks after the NPR interview,

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I received an email
from the Department of Defense.

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The Defense Advanced Research
Project Administration invited me

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to come talk about
innovation and creativity,

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and it's a conversation that quickly
turned into a discussion of food security.

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You see, our national security
is dependent upon our food security.

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Now that we've created these monocultures
that only grow few varieties of each crop,

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if something happens to just one
of those varieties,

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it can have a dramatic impact
upon our food supply.

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And the key to maintaining
our food security

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is securing our biodiversity.

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100 years ago, this was done
by everybody that had a garden

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or a small stand of trees
in their backyard,

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and grew varieties that were passed down
through their family.

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These are plums from just one tree
of 40 fruit in one week in August.

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Several years into the project,

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I was told that I have one of the largest
collection of these fruit

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in the Eastern United States,

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which, as an artist,
is absolutely terrifying --

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(Laughter)

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but in many ways I didn't know what I had.

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I discovered that the majority
of the varieties I had

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were heirloom varieties,

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so those that were grown before 1945,

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which is seen as the dawn
of the industrialization of agriculture.

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Several of the varieties dated back
thousands and thousands of years.

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And finding out how rare they were,

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I became obsessed
with trying to preserve them,

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and the vehicle for this became art.

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I would go into old, vintage orchards
before they were torn out

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and I would save the bowl
or the trunk section

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that possessed the original graft union.

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I started doing pressings
of flowers and the leaves

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to create herbarium specimens.

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I started to sequence the DNA,

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but ultimately, I set out
to preserve the story

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through these copper-plate etchings
and letterpress descriptions.

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To tell the story of the George IV peach,

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which took root between two building
in New York City;

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someone walks by,

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tastes it,

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it becomes a major commercial
variety in the 19th century

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because it tastes just that good.

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Then, [it] all but vanishes

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because it doesn't ship well

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and it doesn't conform
to modern agriculture.

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But I realize that as a story,

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it needs to be told.

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And in the telling of that story,

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it has to include the experience
of being able to touch,

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to smell and to taste those varieties.

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So I set out to create an orchard

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to make these fruit
available to the public,

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and have the aim of placing them
in the highest density of people

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that I could possibly find.

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Naturally, I started looking for an acre
of land in New York City --

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(Laughter)

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which, in retrospect,
seemed rather ambitious,

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and probably the reason why nobody
was returning my phone calls or emails,

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until eventually, four years later,
I heard back from Governors Island.

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So Governors Island is a former naval base

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that was given to the city
of New York in 2000.

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And it opened up all of this land

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just a five-minute ferry ride
from New York.

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And they invited me to create a project
that we're calling "The Open Orchard"

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that will bring back fruit varieties

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that haven't been grown in New York
for over a century.

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Currently in progress,

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"The Open Orchard" will be 50
multi-grafted trees

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that possess 200 heirloom
and antique fruit varieties.

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So these are varieties that originated
or were historically grown in the region.

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Varieties like the Early Strawberry Apple,

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which originated on 13th Street
and Third Avenue.

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Since a fruit tree
can't be preserved by seed,

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"The Open Orchard" will act
like a living gene bank,

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or an archive of these fruit.

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Like "The Tree of 40 Fruit,"

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it will be experiential --

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it will also be symbolic.

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Most importantly, it's going to invite
people to participate in conservation

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and to learn more about their food.

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Through "The Tree of 40 Fruit,"

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I've received thousands and thousands
of emails from people

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asking basic questions about
"How do you plant a tree?"

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With less than three percent
of the population

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having any direct tie to agriculture,

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"The Open Orchard"
is going to invite people

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to come take part in public programming
and to take part in workshops

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to learn how to graft, to grow,
to prune and to harvest a tree.

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To take part in fresh eating
and blossom tours.

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To work with local chefs to learn
how to use these fruit,

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and to recreate centuries-old dishes

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that many of these varieties
were grown specifically for.

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Extending beyond the physical
site of the orchard,

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it will be a cookbook
that compiles all of those recipes.

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It will be a field guide

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that talks about the characteristics
and trait of those fruit,

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their origin and their story.

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Growing up on a farm,

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I thought I understood agriculture

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and I didn't want anything to do with it.

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So I became an artist --

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(Laughter)

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but I have to admit that it's something
within my own DNA.

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And I don't think that I'm the only one.

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100 years ago, we were all much more
closely tied to the culture,

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the cultivation

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and the story of our food,

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and we've been separated from that.

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"The Open Orchard" creates the opportunity

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not just to reconnect
to this unknown past,

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but a way for us to consider
what the future of our food could be.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)