City Deposits

Chicago's inner-city limestone quarries provided first lime and then cement for building construction. These 400 foot deep holes, constrained laterally by the city grid, and vertically by the depth of the 400 million year old limestone deposit, later became dumps for construction debris, and, eventually, they became real estate. This project investigated the invisible history of these holes, as well as histories of waste management and environmental justice activism in Chicago.

Through special permission we were able to tour Stearns Quarry, a 17 acre hole in the Bridgeport neighborhood, while in transition from a wasteland of garbage to a verdant and undulating urban paradise with streams, fish, waterfalls, trees, birds, and a climbing wall.

2005. For Urban/Rural/Wild, an exhibition curated by Sarah Kanouse and Nick Brown, I Space Gallery, Chicago.

City Deposits, a Guide to Chicago's Limestone Quarries, was published as an artists' book.