The Garden Matrix Zine

3 Sisters Project

Spring- Autumn 2020

With:

He Family + Petra Johnson (Lashihai, Yunnan, China) (UK)

Boat Zhang (Tokyo, Japan)

Frog Wing (Mount Kisco, New York)

Petra and Frog connected on WeChat in March 2020, just after the COVID-19 lockdown began in New York. In contemplating how to spend the upcoming few months (perhaps up to a year, or longer), staying in one place, avoiding the spread of the virus, they were both considering doing more vegetable gardening, and seeing how things might develop. Frog would be quarantining in Mount Kisco, in New York state, north of the city. Where Petra was based (in rural Lijiang), she planned to work on her own garden patches, and the He Family would also be continuing their traditional farming practices. Frog and Petra thought it might be fun to keep in touch with each other throughout the year, grow a couple of the same plants at the same time (like the 3 Sisters, an indigenous practice: squash, corn, beans), and document how things turn out in their respective locations. Petra had just spoken with Boat Zhang, and she was thinking of starting a small garden at her apartment in Tokyo, Japan, too, so maybe Boat could join the communications network, and thus the 3 Sisters project began.

Frog then also wanted to invite more people to participate, to get a larger cross-section of cultural backgrounds and geographical locations. The group could produce a project beyond the 3 Sisters concept- something encompassing of peoples’ different experiences and available resources. This led to the curation of The Garden Matrix* zine project (of which 3 Sisters could exist within, as a sub-project).

Below we attach a few samples of the messages relayed, over the course of 2020. Final Documentation Summary can be found within Issue 1 of The Garden Matrix.*

(work in progress, check back for updates // Last edited: June 2021)

*The Garden Matrix zines can be purchased on Etsy, [link here]. All proceeds go towards printing/ shipping/ operational costs.