Artwork copyright Renée Green. Photo courtesy of Western Washington University, 2025.

Artwork copyright Renée Green. Photo courtesy of Western Washington University, 2025.

Artwork copyright Renée Green. Photo courtesy of Western Washington University, 2025.

Artwork copyright Renée Green. Photo courtesy of Western Washington University, 2025.

Space Poem #15 (To the Remembered Earth), 2025

Renée Green
(born 1959)

Location: Western Washington University, Bellingham

About the Artwork

Space Poem #15 (To the Remembered Earth), Part III: Matter Memory Space Time is one of three Space Poems created by Renée Green for Western Washington University. It is part of Green's larger series consisting of colorful banners that use text from book titles, poetry, names of friends who have died, cultural people who influenced her life, as well as phrases written by her to explore language. Green describes this series as being, “open-ended... I’m interested in the possibilities between forms, ideas, and language. I’m always in between, working with combinations of many of these things.”

The eight panels with text feature the following words:

When words, names, and years
Are given space and place
What happens?
If buildings could talk
And hear trees speak
What might they say?
They all together considering
Matter Memory Space Time

This artwork was acquired for the State Art Collection in partnership with Western Washington University.

About the Artist

Green was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and studied art at Wesleyan University in Connecticut. Working as an educator has been an important part of Green's career. She has taught at many institutions, including the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program (ISP), the San Francisco Art Institute, as well as universities in Europe. Green is a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's (MIT) School of Architecture.