ARTISTS
The Short Line
The Short Line is a living garden installation by artist jackie sumell, located just outside the Michener Art Museum鈥檚 main entrance and freely accessible to the public. Visitors are invited to move through this space with intention鈥攖o reflect on the carceral histories rooted in the land, and to imagine what becomes possible when we remember, reimagine, and replant.
The garden traces the approximate footprint of three original cells from the Bucks County Jail鈥檚 鈥渟hort line,鈥� a corridor that once extended from either side of the jail鈥檚 central guardhouse鈥攏ow repurposed as a gallery for the museum鈥檚 modern and contemporary art collection. Where there were once bars and bricks, there is now soil, solidarity, and shared history. This act of transformation insists that we cannot heal what we refuse to confront.
At the heart of The Short Line is phytoremediation鈥攖he use of plants like clover, sunflower, and willow, to naturally cleanse soil of toxins and restore balance. These plants perform the kind of quiet, generative work our society too often overlooks: the slow, necessary labor of restoration. The Short Line challenges us to consider what is buried beneath our feet鈥攁nd what it means to grow something new in the footprint of what once was. If we ignore the past, we risk repeating it. But if we tend to it鈥攍ike soil鈥攚e may begin to collectively repair.
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The Short Line is a living garden installation by artist jackie sumell, located just outside the Michener Art Museum鈥檚 main entrance and freely accessible to the public. Visitors are invited to move through this space with intention鈥攖o reflect on the carceral histories rooted in the land, and to imagine what becomes possible when we remember, reimagine, and replant.
The garden traces the approximate footprint of three original cells from the Bucks County Jail鈥檚 鈥渟hort line,鈥� a corridor that once extended from either side of the jail鈥檚 central guardhouse鈥攏ow repurposed as a gallery for the museum鈥檚 modern and contemporary art collection. Where there were once bars and bricks, there is now soil, solidarity, and shared history. This act of transformation insists that we cannot heal what we refuse to confront.
At the heart of The Short Line is phytoremediation鈥攖he use of plants like clover, sunflower, and willow, to naturally cleanse soil of toxins and restore balance. These plants perform the kind of quiet, generative work our society too often overlooks: the slow, necessary labor of restoration. The Short Line challenges us to consider what is buried beneath our feet鈥攁nd what it means to grow something new in the footprint of what once was. If we ignore the past, we risk repeating it. But if we tend to it鈥攍ike soil鈥攚e may begin to collectively repair.
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