Missouri River-rafters' hand-built craft and completed journey to New OrleansFollow the link to view snapshots of the send-off event 'Breakfast Launch with Release:'
Source: Carolyn Szczepanski:
http:www//blogs.pitch.com/plog/2007/08/when_artists_turn_huck_finn.phpThey constructed the raft, 'Marvel,' in space donated by the Pistol Social Club and OIC.
A preview of the rafters' send-off and an interview with
community organizer Jamie Burkart:
Their start may have been a bit chaotic, but a handful of Kansas
City and California art-adventurers have sailed across the state of
Missouri on a homemade raft crafted from recycled materials.
Jamie Burkart, a slender filmmaker with a penchant for
pastel-colored clothing and off-the-wall art installations, came up
with the idea of an experiential boat expedition this past winter. A
Kansas City native but current student of film and digital media at the
University of California- Santa Cruz, Burkart became fascinated with
Kansas City’s transportation history.
This spring, he organized a subterranean screening of old trolley
videos in an abandoned tunnel that used to shuttle goods from the West
Bottoms to the heart of downtown. That, he says, got him thinking about
what Kansas City would be like without highways and how the metro had
lost its connection with its historic thoroughfare: the Missouri River.
“My experience growing up here was that it was an invisible place, a
dividing line between north and south,” he says. “But City Hall used to
be on the river front. There was a time when we were proud of the
river, part of it.”
“I don’t know if I’ve ever touched the water,” he adds. “Everybody thinks it’s poison.”
So this summer, Burkart and six others decided to experience the
river for themselves through an adventure they whimsically titled
“Release yourself onto the river until the taste of salt.”
The goal:
sail from Kansas City to the Gulf of Mexico on a boat made with
discarded materials.
The group — two Kansas City natives and four of their acquaintances
from Santa Cruz — started construction in the West Bottoms at the start
of July. They didn’t have any preconceived design for the boat, Burkart
says, but let the materials they found dictate what kind of vessel
would carry them more than 1000 miles across the Missouri and
Mississippi Rivers.
They used blue plastic barrels from a Pepsi facility as pontoons to
make the raft float. The plywood for the body of the craft came from a
dance floor Burkart’s parents built for his first boy-girl dance party.
The paddlewheel to propel the vessel was welded together with fallen
road signs and bits of metal Burkart dug out of neighborhood dumpsters
(with the owners consent, he says).
After pushing back the launch date several times, the raft finally set
sail on July 21. But that was no easy task. A dozen helpful and curious
Kansas City residents showed up that Saturday morning to help the crew
get underway.
Little did they know, Burkart intended for the crowd to
physically carry the structure from the West Bottoms to the Kaw Point
boat ramp — nearly two miles. The group muscled the raft several
hundred feet before they called in a favor from a friend with a
trailer. Once they loaded the raft behind the red Suburban, a caravan
of cyclists and cars followed the boat to the water.
As they slid the raft into river, members of the group held their
breath, in part from anxiety about the boat’s buoyancy -- and out of
surprise at how foul the water smelled. Burkart’s mother, Anne, wasn’t
the only one to cheer when the craft stayed afloat. Once it was loaded
up with suitcases and canned-food provisions and a yellow bike to power
the paddlewheel, though, the boat listed precariously to one side.
Nevertheless, the crew of seven left that evening for the journey. More
than two weeks later, they’re still underway.
Before the departure, Burkart admitted that the group had virtually
no water-faring experience. And just about everyone they spoke with, he
says, warned them of the dangers trying to traverse the Missouri and
Mississippi: the quick current, the barge traffic, the natural debris
and man-made wing dikes not visible at the water’s surface. Luckily,
everyone on board is equipped with a life jacket.
Over the past several weeks, I’ve tried to get in contact with the
group, but calls to the members’ cell phones went unanswered. Last
Monday, Burkart’s mother told me that she’d gotten a call from the
artist-turned-sailors, reassuring her that they were doing fine and had
made it all the way to Jefferson City — halfway across the state of
Missouri.
In a brief conversation today, Burkart told me that they’d made it to the other end of the Show-Me State.
“I'm looking at The Arch right now,” he said, speaking on his cell phone from a stop in St. Louis.
He didn’t have much time to talk, but said the biggest challenge
thus far was navigating the watery intersection where the Missouri
meets the Mississippi.
“Our highest adventure has been going over this thing at confluence
called the Chain of Rocks,” he said. “There’s a small waterfall and we
went over. It was pretty exciting.”
Check out
Burkart’s MySpace page for his blog entries before the crew set sail and stay tuned to the Plog for further trip updates.
Further resources regarding the completed journey and project:
Flickr page photographer Julia Fredenburg and Burkart @
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=jamie+burkartCharlotte Street Foundation about the gallery installation @
http://www.charlottestreet.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/burkart-press-release.pdf