Notice/Know/Kin: A Human/Tree Biography

This mixed-media art exhibit by Nina Browne, a woodworker turned urban naturalist, invites us inside the artist’s life and inside wood to reflect on our living relationships with trees and the Earth.

The title, Notice/Know/Kin, reflects Browne’s invitation to move beyond “plant blindness” toward deeper relationship: first noticing trees, then knowing them more fully, and ultimately seeing ourselves as family with them. Drawing on the work of Robin Wall Kimmerer, Alex Shigo, and Indigenous ecological wisdom, Browne’s art reveals wood as alive and dynamic in its resilience and reciprocity.

Her close-up studies of tree cells illuminate forests within wood grain: rivers, mountains, and skies embedded in microscopic form. Other works honor the spiritual and cultural roles of trees, from powdered Sassafras leaves in gumbo to sacred imagery that links forests with cathedrals. Across the exhibition, visitors are asked: What do you notice about the trees around you? What might it mean to know them? Could you call them kin?

Notice/Know/Kin is both a personal biography and a call to collective kinship, reminding us that trees are not background, but family—vital companions in the fabric of our shared survival.

Included with Garden admission.

Get Tickets Become a Member

About the Artist

Artist Nina Browne has managed various Community Greening programs at Brooklyn Botanic Garden since 2011, and is also an activist, anthropologist, furniture- and cabinet-maker, mother, NYC Citizen Pruner, ordained Interspiritual minister, and urban environmental educator. View more of her work at ninabrowne.com.