Plot 46 is the eponymous name of an art-research project I am conducting on a 400 square foot allotment on Maple Hill Urban Farm in Ottawa where I explore the benefits of nurturing the soil food web while producing food and sequestering carbon. I wonder why so many of us have become alienated from the soil and wage war on nature with tilling, chemicals, monocropping, and genetic modification.
When I arrived in the spring of 2022, my plot was a weedy patch of spent Leda clay – slippery and sticky in the rain and hard as rock when it dried out. On the farm, synthetic chemicals are prohibited and an abundant supply of leaf mulch / compost is always available for use by allotment holders. I practice no-till gardening and I keep my growing beds always covered with mulch. Starting my third year, I am already seeing the soil transform into a rich brown loam. Nevertheless, I still feel like a stranger on this land with so much to learn.
I find myself caught up imagining life below ground – the mysterious underworld. The Unterwelt of Plot 46 is a poem I wrote to embody being (in the) soil. To evoke a sense of “soilness” without trying to be representative, I produced five experimental prints and integrate them with a spoken poem in a two-minute video. Click here to watch.
Here is the poem.

This poem will be published in Soils Turn, A Field Guide to Artistic Earthly Engagements, to be published in 2025 by ecoartspace. Press here to order.