trestle

Trestle Support Systems is a collaborative public art project at the Northern Pacific Railyard in Brainerd, Minnesota presenting two monumental site-specific installations, Trestle and Trestle Worker, reflecting the architectural spatiality of former railyard spaces, referencing empowerment of community workers, and utilizing ideas of affective stimuli, physical embodiment, and rural vacancy. The abstract wooden Trestle physically explores the emblematic rail transportation support form, the trestle as figural representation, and expands the spatial vernacular of the Northern Pacific site as a sculptural and public art space.

The NP railyard is a historic grouping of twelve brick and wood buildings sitting on a forty-seven-acre plot of land near the Mississippi River. Listed on the National Historic Register and a past EPA Superfund site, the NP industrial site and its Blacksmith Shop becomes sculptural agent to the Trestle spur. Abstracted from traditional trestle design and referenced from Crow Wing County History Museum photographic imagery, the fanning wooden wings reflect air movement of trains speeding over the trestle.

Running the length of NP Blacksmith Shop, viewers can walk down center of the Trestle as it architecturally aligns with original side brick columns, overhead steal cross beams and interior railroad tracks. An original 8-track/4-speaker digital sound composition by sound artist Michael Flora accompanied exhibition environs. Viewers enter via original 18-foot-high rail door for Trestle access. A children’s empowerment workshop and a self-published catalog with essay by art critic/curator Sheila Dickinson complemented the exhibition.