Miguel Braceli’s project will seek to approach the daylighting Tibbetts Brook master plan as a participatory experience, drawing viewers into a filmed performance where the rivers and people are braided within a collective event of learning and making. The project will evoke the interconnectedness of the entire Tibbetts watershed, which extends over 2500 acres from Yonkers and Westchester County into the hillsides of Riverdale, Fieldston, Marble Hill, through Van Cortlandt Park, Kingsbridge Heights, and down into the Harlem River. The first section of Braceli’s performance in Van Cortlandt Park will echo the collective braiding of streams flowing into the larger brook. This collaborative film project will be contextualized by the voices of participants along with perspectives on Tibbetts from experts on the daylighting initiative. The completed video will serve as a springboard for community dialogue around ideas for the greenway master plan to help ensure that it responds to the needs and visions of local residents . 

With flowing textiles, diverse voices, and the supporting bodies of participants, the act of braiding becomes a learning exchange; connecting the layered ecosystems and peoples that are woven together in this complex and ever evolving community. The braid begins as a metaphor and ends as a tool to measure the different sections of the corridor as well as a means to approach the challenges and opportunities of a linear urban park project. Braceli’s film will mirror the diverse ecosystems and peoples that are woven together in this complex and ever evolving community. 

After the video is completed, Braceli will conduct a walk in Spring 2023 along the corridor. This procession (part 2 of the project) will be designed so that participants can gain onsite knowledge and use it to propose ideas in a 1:1 scale collective drawing at the end of the performance. Similar to Braceli’s other communal projects, this work aims to use poetical gestures to address social, political, and ecological challenges face to face with the transformative possibilities of education.