Author: Todd Smith

Hi! I am an interdisciplinary artist and committed educator. From 2007-2010 I climbed a tree everyday and documented the project with photography, video and writing on this blog. I am revisiting the trees and writing again starting March 2018. Stay tuned. My work considers our collective impact on the urban environment. Projects range from community-based, data-driven projects interpreting bike usage into sound, photography and video series exploring human movement through urban structures and green spaces, and interactive sculptures that vary in their use of found materials, analog technologies, and emerging digital media. I currently teach a variety of 2D, 3D and digital subjects at universities in the Louisville, Kentucky area.
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DAY 26


DAY 26
04.30.07
TREE 30 & 31

What a climb to end on my first month here! I explored more of the Sanctuary for about 3 hours on a hot afternoon. On the edge of a clearing was a tree with a big windy branch that twisted low to the ground right over the path. I cat crawled up to the split trunk. Caught between the split trunk was a branch of another tree. I peaked around and saw the first branch of a nice tall tree. The tree I was on was a dead end (literally) so to make myself feel better from yesterday I made the transfer and climbed and climbed and climbed till I got to the top of the tree. I swayed in the wind and relaxed feeling very satisfied. I was way up there. A very good climb. I was going to count my body lengths as I climbed down, but in my concentration to not fall I forgot. I’d kinda like to know. Next time I climb it I’ll measure with a string.

4-30-08:  The first picture focuses on that windy branch low to the ground.  When I climbed back down and returned to that limb I went down in a strange way.  I went sliding down on my stomach head first.  I’ve done this other times as well.  I figure if I start to slip I would be in the perfect position to quickly wrap my arms and legs around and squeeze. 

The second picture was my attempt to capture both trees from a distance.  They are the skinny ones in the dead center.  The leaf is from the second tree, a beech tree.  Though time has turned the leaf slightly brown it still retains a little of the light green of a new spring leaf. 

This climb really did make up for the previous few days’ failures.  It was my highest climb to date which is why I was so interesting in finding the actual height.  Stay tuned for the measurement. 

Yesterday I tried a multi-tree transfer.  I called the video 5treetransfer4-29 but after watching the video, I think there are six trees involved.  Just to help you as you watch this video (which is a little long) the first tree had a few thorns on the trunk.  That is why I pause and look at my hand.  It ended up bleeding.  On the second to last tree, where I slowly climb up to try to reach for the last tree, my arms were getting so worn out by this point that I was nervous my grip would give out.  It’s a battle between hurrying so I won’t fatigue, but rushing the transfer and having to climb higher ,then reaching over and over which wears out my arms even more.  You”ll see: