Circle of Bees operates with artistic, educational, and scientific scopes. We produce utlitiarian folk art, living classroom experience, and scientific/technical experiments, illuminating the human experience of wild natural ecology in sub/urban space. We are one piece of the permaculture revolution, exciting peaceful agrarian renaissance and rewilding in towns and cities, block by block, neighbor by neigbor. Rather than inconvenient truths, we illuminate the fun and adventure of an organic revolution: may it proceed as carefully as possible so that no one gets hurt, and as quickly as possible for the same reason! We propose the technical project of sustainable habitat and agrarian lifestyles in the heart of the first world as a solution to every social ill facing civilization today, from homelessness and poverty, to mental health and violence, to inequality and prejudice - all the answers can be found back on the farm and in the wilderness.
Pictured is Paul Bugni helping to install "
Resurrection Cycle" in Central Park Davis, April 19-21, 2019. Read more about the art
here.
In our hometown we recently completed "100 Hives Davis", a living ecological art spectacle that lived for three days in Central Park in the heart of downtown.
The work, involving 77 rainbow colored swarm capture hives, caught 7 swarms and was seen by hundreds of people at the Davis Farmer's Market.
After a turn as a major downtown art display, the swarm capture hives found homes in city trees and private backyards where they persist as a city-wide network of swarm capture hives. These utiliatian art pieces collectively provide a public service, preventing natural, gentle swarms of honey bees from infesting walls and chimneys in homes and businesses. They are also a platform for continues art making.
As we continue to pursue individual art collaborations in Davis, we have begun the next leg of our adventure with "The PolliNation", an artwork that will expand our spectacle-making focus to include native pollinators, and which will see our project make an impact in Sacramento.
Meanwhile, we have left the following short-list for our skeleton crew of Davis activists to accomplish in their spare time:
- 3rd Street Community Thoroughfare: to transform 3rd street into a automobile-free (excepting emergency and commercial vehicles), citizen-friendly passage from the University to the railroad tracks.
- Dark Nights / Night Fest: While the evidence is overwhelming that blue spectrum light flooding our nights is damaging to the cognitive health of people as well as nocturnal animals (many of whom ar pollinators), and while even more evidence demonstrates that crime diminishes when nights are dark and lights are out, there is no comprehensive plan to eliminate light pollution from our cities, towns, and suburbs. Why not? Not only would we save energy, improve our pyshcological health, and our benefit our ecosystem, we will be able again to see the stars. That's folks, should be a human right.
- Ecologist on City Staff: Parks and Recreation should be managed by trained conservation ecologists (including beekeepers) whose role is to build healthy urban ecosystems, educate the public on the importance of living within a healthy natural ecosystem, and generally act as heroic stewards of the natural world in places where people live.
- Fourth of July Bon Fire: Fireworks suck. They are loud and polluting. Bon-fires are really much cooler, especially when they are huge and savely managed.
We expect these bullets to be wrapped up by the end of the year, thanks!
Aside from these noble and ambitious goals, we do many other things in Davis, often in collaboration with our friendly
Thanks
Leslie Crenna of EcoAssistant and the good people of WaterWise
City of Davis Arts and Cultural Affairs and Rachel Hartsough
Donna Billick and the Billick Rock Apiary
Whole Systems Design and Derek and Johnny
Restoration Landscaping by Billy Krimmel
Farm Davis and Farm 2.6
Cloverleaf Farm
Flower Mama Katie
Tree Davis
CoolDavis
Tuleyome
The NiƱo Lab
Burning Man
Sacramento Beecharmers and Rachel Morrison
Restoration Landscaping by Billy Krimmel
The Davis Food Co-op
Davis Dollars and Nick Barry
Yolo County District 2 Supervisor Don Saylor and City of Davis Chief Innovation Officer Diane Paro