Rachel Epp Buller
Newton, KS
https://balance.ddtr.net
IG: @rebuller74

One Hundred Days of Walking
2023 (following daily walking and drawing in 2022)
One hundred accordion books, watercolor, ink, braided cotton
Books are 4″ in height but the hanging installation was about 6′ x 12′

Artist Statement

Go for a walk every day.
Listen to what the
snow, ice,
sun, wind,
trees, birds,
structures, and beings
tell your body about this place.
Keep listening.

This is the score I wrote for myself before spending four months in Edmonton, Alberta. As someone trained in Pauline Oliveros’ methods of Deep Listening, I turned to daily walking as a path toward listening and learning in a place that was new to me. The more I walked and the more I listened, the more I recognized and became familiar with the many beings inhabiting this place. Dogs and their walkers became specific over time as we encountered each other repeatedly on the paths. Certain trees became distinct to me as I noticed how they changed in appearance in sunshine or snow showers or evening darkness. I began to recognize the calls of magpies as well as the coyotes and snowshoe hares whose criss-crossing footprints preceded me across snowy landscapes. Each day, with my steps, I aimed to listen, and to keep listening.

One Hundred Days of Walking visually represents this conceptual daily practice of walking and listening. One hundred accordion books filled with landscapes and horizons became the basis for this 2023 installation in which I braided 100 feet of cotton to string the books from end to end. When hung from the ceiling (or, alternatively, displayed on a long tabletop), the books become a meandering path. The accumulation of folded paper is a wandering—moving forward, turning back, continuing to walk and listen, step by step.