The arts committee unveils its second outdoor exhibition at Pritchard Park.

The once pristine oil drum lids are wet with recent rainfall and already rusting to orange. Hovering over the ivy-carpeted forest floor, the discs march in a line over, through and under vegetation and fallen trees. At the cliff’s edge, they seem to drop off like lemmings.

But looking over the edge, one sees the unbroken line cascade down the bluff toward the Wyckoff clean-up site below.

“It’s a desire to order and control things floating above the non-native landscape, forcing its way through this landscape,” said Kristin Tollefson, island artist and curator for Collocation, a temporary outdoor installation at Pritchard Park.

At the same time, she said, the rusting of the lids “is about how natural forces overtake” the man-made.

Works of 11 artists from Bainbridge Island and the Puget Sound region debuted last weekend on 20 acres at Pritchard Park in the island’s second outdoor art exhibit, which will run through Sept. 24. The works sit on property that the Bainbridge Island Land Trust and city are working to acquire through fund-raising efforts.

The exhibit’s name, Collocation, refers both to the assembling of things at a single site, and the fact that the site itself has been through many iterations over the generations: a brick-making factory, a creosote plant and worker town, and today a Superfund clean-up site and memorial to Japanese Americans interned during World War II.

Michelle Burgess of the Bainbridge Island Public Art Committee said with the success of the island’s first outdoor exhibit, “Arts in the Meadow” at Blakely Harbor Park in summer 2003, the committee immediately began planning for the next one.

“The public responded to (Arts in the Meadow) on two levels, enjoying the ephemeral nature of the artworks and the setting,” she said.

Several sites were considered for the new display, but Pritchard was a top runner from the start.

“Physically, it’s a fantastic site. It has a lot of different ecosystems – forest, beach – and history,” Burgess said. “We asked people to really engage (the park), address the natural kinetic elements and speak to the history of the site.”

Tollefson said the conflicting meanings on the Pritchard Park site informed the works and the exhibit.

“What’s different about this as opposed to ‘Arts in the Meadow’ is there’s no way to ignore the friction between human impact and the natural,” she said, citing not only the non-native flora, but also the chemical contamination from the former creosote plant. “There are huge forces at work, so a lot of the works reflect those two things.”

Red and dead

The ex­hi­bit begins at a dead madrona tree, painted a startling red by island artist Diana Liljelund and standing a few degrees off the vertical like a Japanese flower ar­range­ment.

In a reversal of the non-native plants that have overtaken the park, Liljelund relocated the dead tree from an inland farm to a shoreline location where it would more likely be found.

Up the slope, artworks along the trail prod the mind.

The line of metal lids balanced on small pieces of bamboo make a deliberate beeline to the Superfund clean-up site.

“The sculpture demonstrates a contrast between the organic and our human compulsion for order,” said Tim Rohleder, one of a team of six at rbf Architects, with whom Tollefson collaborated on the work. “When repeated, a connection is made, an energy is shared.

“While they touch their surroundings, they are not part of it. It is a delicate balance of power and fragility.”

The use of lids from 55-gallon drums is no accidental reference to the former creosote plant, Rohleder said.

“Things that went in, in one context as threatening, in another context are elegant and beautiful,” he said.

Focusing on the non-native plants, Ruthie Tomlinson has her work suspended from the limbs of a non-native laurel whose branches form a green, leafy cave underneath.

Hanging from the branches are small, white handmade books, each about a non-native plant.

Inter­spersed with the books are clear plastic envelopes containing leaf samples with words like “beauty” and “desire,” describing human motivations for introducing foreign plants into the environment.

The invasive English ivy, Scotch broom, bamboo and Japanese knotweed are just some of the remnants of past visitors littering the site; a fire hydrant, an abandoned car, a clothesline, toys and a toilet are nearby.

For her own work, Tollefson highlighted the families of workers that used to live on the site.

Through an archway of non-native quince with blackened, petrified fruit, two “found” chairs sit companionably side by side in a “room” cocooned by weeds.

Black balls threaded through the wire of the chair backs echo the petrified fruit.

“I like this idea of ghosts, that there was somebody there before,” Tollefson said. “I like the domestic-ness, that it wasn’t always a brick factory, but people lived here and (spent their) daily lives here.”

Literally cutting close to home, island sculptor Gregory Glynn built a “foundation” of cut-and-stacked Scotch broom in a spot with a water view. Just 15 feet away are three trees that were “girdled” – presumably to enhance a neighbor’s view – and slowly dying.

“What I wanted to do was put people into a hypothetical situation, where people consider it as an ideal view property, but to contrast it with the drama of the girdled trees,” Glynn said. “What is more invasive? The plants, or us in our actions? Which is more harmful?”

Glynn was also one of the artists who participated in “Arts in the Meadow.” There, he raked grass into long, timber-like shapes – reflecting Blakely’s sawmill past – that eventually decayed.

“With the Scotch broom it’s the same idea of life cycle,” Glynn said. “Nature is really the supreme sculptor. To let nature have the final action on the piece removes my hand from it. The final action on the piece represents how grand nature truly is.”

* * * * *

A walk in the park

The exhibit “Collocation” will be up through Sept. 24 at Pritchard Park. Enter from Creosote Place off of Eagle Harbor Drive. For more information, see www.artshum.org, or leave comments at collocation2005.blogspot.com.

Blackbird Bakery will feature an exhibit about the project throughout July. Collocation participants include Michelle Arab, Gregory Glynn, Diana Liljelund, Dan Linz, Perri Lynch, Melanie Noel, Polly Purvis, rbf Architects, Amanda Sturgeon, Kristin Tollefson and Ruthie Tomlinson.

Summer events at the park include:

• Concert at Pritchard Park with Zimbabwe marimba music of Ruzivo, 5-7 p.m. July 23 (www.ruzivo.org).

• Kite workshop led by artist and kite-maker Greg Kono for all ages, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Aug. 6 (www.drachen.org)

• Work with artists Marcia Iwasaki and Kristin Tollefson on a final site-specific installation on Aug. 27. Information: 842-7901.