The Mohawk River Project

Professor Anna Davidson (Cornell University)
Thursday, January 30 | 2:30PM ET | Online and Open to the Public
Teionontatátie, “a river flowing through a mountain,” was once the dominant means of travel and fishing by the Haudenosaunee people. Named after the Mohawk tribe in English, the river is now one of the most modified rivers in the United States, and has been polluted by industrial waste, abundant raw sewage overspills, nitrogen, and road salt.
The Mohawk River Project exhibit features the works of Anna Davidson, senior research associate and lecturer in Natural Resources, and her graduate student, Anna Mehlhorn, that stem from leading a capstone course that intertwined art, science and culture in the study of the Mohawk River. Davidson and her students traveled to various communities along the watershed soliciting their concerns, hopes, data, and other messages about their river. Several of the pieces in the exhibit, including a 15-foot canoe, are covered in the messages from these participants, including Mohawk River Watershed Youth Climate Summit members, Indigenous people of the Mohawk River Valley, scientists working on the river, Cornell students, and seventh graders from the Middle School in New York Mills, a town increasingly prone to flooding and deeply affected by hurricane Irene.
Davidson works and teaches at the interface of art and science. She currently teaches ecological art in the Environment and Sustainability Program at Cornell University.
This event is part of 2025 Spring Seminar Series: Applied Water Research in New York State hosted by the New York State Water Resources Institute. The series runs on Thursdays from 2:30 - 3:30PM ET from January 23 - March 6, 2025.
The work presented was prepared for the NYS Water Resources Institute at Cornell University and the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation, with support from the NYS Environmental Protection Fund.