The Confluence

The Confluence

by Joan Hall

Location: Terminal 1, Near Gate C5

Hall’s interest in systems and relationships led her to design an artwork for the airport that is influenced by the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, two of the greatest rivers in North America. Her research took Hall to the Confluence multiple times to observe the spot where the two rivers combine into one. She made rubbings of native plants while walking the banks of the river.

She also discovered that Lewis and Clark collected more than 220 plant samples on their journey up the Missouri River and these samples far outnumber other objects in their collection, as plants where extremely valuable to nineteenth-century Euro-American researchers. Hall discovered these explorers used plants, such as the Compass Golden Rod – which always points to the North, to navigate on the plains. In her work, she depicted the Compass Golden Rod as a ghost-like shape. Rubbings of other native plants are placed within portals and navigational charts, which refer to the importance of commerce on the rivers. The turbulent rivers themselves are represented through the two colors of swirling blue that dominate and flow through the design.