ยFruit of the Orchard: Environmental Justice in East Texasย chronicles the story of Winona, Texas, a tiny town of 500, and its struggles with a nearby toxic waste facility. When it was built in 1982, residents were told that fruit trees would be planted on some of the land. However, it wasnยt fruit tress, but ominous clouds of orange smoke billowing from the facility that the residents soon started seeing. Years passed, and as the smoke continued to rise, so did cancer and birth defect rates in both humans and animals in Winona. Residents blamed the plant, but the plant dismissed the complaints outright. Photographer Tammy Cromer-Campbellยs book of the same name, the basis for the exhibit, helped raise consciousness about the plight of Winonaยs people with her striking black-and-white photos. Taken with a plastic Holga camera, many of her photographs are of children, chilling for their depictions of innocence somehow warped and distorted by an unseen evil. As for Winona, the plant was closed in 1998 due to negative publicity, thanks in part to Cromer-Campbellยs images.
Mondays-Fridays, 10 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Starts: July 25. Continues through Aug. 31
This article appears in Aug 9-15, 2007.