I kind of fly sort of tiny formations
I guess looks like moving constellations
lots of shooting stars going in
different directions at the same time
pidgins you know they've been
domesticated for thousands of years
they're birds that have always served
served us they're very smart animals
that are clearly paying attention to us
and choose to live where we live and in
some ways that kind of like a liaison
between you know the human in the
natural world fly-by-night references a
lost New York I grew up in Brooklyn I
remember as a child seeing pigeon
fanciers on the rooftop they would be
flying at night and it was mesmerizing
in Brooklyn when I moved here there was
several hidden coops in green plain and
there's always been several and you know
there were several in Red Hook in Sunset
Park and you know it's drastically
declined since then people are selling
buildings they're being torn down to
build high-rises that you know have Roof
Gardens and things like that rather than
pigeon coops we're here in the Brooklyn
Navy Yard and we're standing on a about
a hundred and thirty foot helicopter
landing vessel we have about thirteen
pigeon coops on here with about 2,000
pigeons this whole section here was what
was previously like the helicopter
landing pad and we basically outfitted
the boat for another type of landing if
you will at sunset three nights a week
for six weeks we'll have flights and as
the light starts to get dimmer and
dimmer and dimmer you notice that
they're wearing small LEDs on their feet
where historically messages would have
gone for messenger pigeon
when I first started this project or
started thinking about it I was working
on another project where I had trained
pigeons to fly from Havana to Key West
with Cuban cigars
that was sort of when I decided to try
to put a small light on one of the birds
to see what the effect would be like
we've never done a large Commission with
Duke and he talked about this idea the
Brooklyn Navy Yard immediately became
part of the conversation this was the
site that actually had the largest naval
pigeon coop in the country the coupe's
for all the pigeons that were all sort
of somewhat designed around the original
military pigeon coops that they used
right here in the Brooklyn Navy Yard
previous to there being you know modern
radios and whatnot that was the only way
that they could communicate there's a
couple pigeons in the Smithsonian Museum
that received purple hearts and then
we're later taxidermied and saved in the
museum I don't know maybe the birds
would feel that was that much of an
honor this is definitely the biggest and
most complex project I've worked on so
far a lot of the artwork that I've done
in the past has been dealing with the
urban waterfront and the waterfront
communities in general my own connection
with the urban waterfront and whatnot is
just that that just sort of the fact
that it's there and sort of kind of
particularly in New York City goes
unnoticed and that you have this mass
amount of open space that's really in a
sense wilderness this project has a lot
to do with human identity and in the end
just in their connection with nature as
a kind of that disconnect grows wider
and people sort of seem less aware of
their surroundings so typically when we
fly them to get them into the aviary and
then we leave all the doors open and we
just kind of take a plastic bag like a
black plastic bag and we blow our
whistle and they all come they all fly
out and then we get them all onto the
roof
many of our projects kind of touch on
larger political issues and some allow
for just profound experiences and I
think this one is a perfect marriage of
both so some people might come and just
be inspired and have this kind of outer
body experience of seeing the pigeons
and others might actually think more
deeply about the nature that surrounds
us
feel very grateful to be able to carry
out such a combination of various sort
of lifelong dreams all together in one
project