Photographs of natural places & community connections in the South Washington Watershed District
When Sarah Lilja accepted a position as the Artist in Residence for the South Washington Watershed District (SWWD), she wasn’t necessarily expecting to be astonished by the landscape or the projects she would photograph. “What I’ve enjoyed is digging in deeper, especially in the suburban communities,” she says. “It’s been surprising to see all of the treasures out there.”
SWWD is located entirely in Washington County and contains portions of ten cities and townships – Afton, Cottage Grove, Denmark Township, Grey Cloud Island Township, Hastings, Lake Elmo, Newport, Oakdale, St. Paul Park and Woodbury. The watershed district was originally formed in 1993 to address flooding concerns in southern Woodbury and Cottage Grove. In the thirty years since, it has played a lead role in numerous watershed restoration efforts, including re-connecting a backwater channel of the Mississippi River at Grey Cloud Island; bringing trout back to Trout Brook in Afton; and creating a conservation corridor that extends from southern Woodbury to the Mississippi River, with habitat, recreation, and flood management components.
“Working as the artist-in-residence has been sort of like having a ticket to get into all of these unique experiences,” Lilja says. When the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources released heritage brook trout into Trout Brook last month, she was one of several people carrying baby trout in bright green buckets down to the water’s edge. She received a “behind the scenes” tour of Woodbury’s new Hassenbank Stormwater Park while it was under construction, and got to meet the park’s buckthorn-eating goats, up close and personal.
Lilja has also spent a lot of time exploring parks and trails within the watershed district. “It’s been fun to have the directive to go out and explore,” she explains. “Even though I live in the watershed district, many of these places were new to me.” She mentions Bailey School Forest in Newport and Glacial Valley Park on the border of Woodbury and Cottage Grove as two examples.
One of Lilja’s favorite images from her artist residency is a winter scene at Wilmes Lake in Woodbury, which she photographed in black and white. “There was so little snow last winter, and it made it hard to find beauty sometimes. But the red oaks around the lake created a beautiful accent.” Another set of images that Lilja is fond of are two photos of oak leaves balanced on the water’s surface at Colby Lake. “It was a grey day but a fun discovery to see those leaves floating so perfectly.”
After spending a year following the SWWD’s programs and activities, Lilja says she’s so impressed that she’s actually applying to join the district’s citizen advisory committee. “This is a local unit of government that I didn’t know anything about, but they are doing such great work and with a very small staff,” she explains.
Sarah Lilja’s photography will be on display at Carpenter Nature Center (12805 St. Croix Trail S, Hastings) from November 5 – December 5 in an exhibit entitled Connecting at the Confluence: Photographs of natural places & community connections in the South Washington Watershed District. The exhibit opening on Nov. 7, 6-8pm is free and open to the public.
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