[background instrumental music]
[speaker: Frances Vallejo] Hi, my name is Francis Vallejo.
I am an illustrator in Detroit, Michigan.
I also am a full time instructor at the College for Creative Studies in Detroit.
I do illustrations for the publishing industry,
for comic books, and for really exciting
projects.
Francis Vallejo was selected as Arctic Refuge’s 2022 artist for the Voices of the Wilderness Artist in Residence Program...
a program sponsored by the USDA Forest Service, National Park Service, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The project in Alaska
was with the Voices of the Wilderness, and what they do is they send an artist
out into the refuges in Alaska and we document our experience.
What did I see?
Experience it with me.
Francis accompanied a group of researchers and technicians in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge who study birds and small mammals.
Started in Fairbanks,
and then I went into the Canning River
bird camp and lived with some biologists,
Established in 1979, the Canning River Delta Camp is a remote field camp in the Arctic where birds have been studies for over 50 years.
and I walked up and down their routes while they studied
small animals and birds.
These biologists are hardcore.
They would walk up to 15 miles a day.
I wanted to feel what they were feeling,
put the same amount of effort into the experience that they were.
While I was doing that,
if I was able to just pull out my sketch book and sketch them,
When we were at base camp in the morning eating breakfast, I would sketch.
I also had a lanyard on my arm with a camera,
and I was just documenting everything. [camera click]
One of my favorite memories was arriving
at this bird camp and thinking, This is stunning.
It's also flat.
I knew that going in, that it was going to be a tundra.
As someone that likes to play with, again, depth and
and dynamic compositions, I'm like, Well, I have a long horizon.
You know, my memory of when we walked to the top of Alaska
and the terrain changed into sand and there was driftwood.
And I remember starting to lay on the ground
and putting these foreground shots of this driftwood.
That was the moment when I realized this tundra, this flat space,
that how the people interacted with it and how I could take a very micro approach
and look at the small world that was on the ground.
That's when it clicked. I'm like, I got it.
So I spent the rest of the residency laying on the ground.
So as a result of sketching
when I could, always photographing and just living the experience,
I felt like I had the material to then bring it back here in my studio
and then create a body of work that I'm going to share with my community
and hopefully connect my city with those in Alaska.
I represent a population in the urban community, in the city communities.
This is something that someone from Eight Mile in Detroit
or someone from Philly, it exists for them as well.
But there's refuges all over the place.
Here in Detroit. We have one off the Detroit River.
They have one inside the city of Philadelphia.
And now more than ever, they're very important -
for us to support them, to also experience them.
the efforts
to keep these thriving are a big deal.
And I had such a powerful experience with them that I'm telling
everyone to just look to see where your refugees are at.
We need them.
Going into this project, it was better than what I could have ever expected.
I spent seven days with 14 people and
I remember calling up some friends and family near the end and saying,
I'm not sure I've ever had a warmer human experience.
And when I remember this, it's about the people of Alaska.
And that's the basis of the body of work, is to celebrate the natural lands.
But how the natural lands
are able to bring together community.
Those experiences impacted me profoundly.
And it was a privilege to to be part of that.
I think I looked at this as a way
to escape the busy world, and I did.
But I found that escape still with people.
And that was a great lesson to learn.