Trees are living time capsules of land. They are witnesses of history. They witness climate changes, migration, colonization, industrialization, and urbanization. They live long enough to witness long histories of displacement and discrimination, as well as forgotten massacres and killings that took place under their shades. Outliving human lifespan, they are the evidence of the Anthropocene. They are the nonhuman others among the others.

“Witness of Land’’ is a performance project that maneuvers augmented reality (AR) technology to bring forth the presence of witness trees. Upon the arboreal survivor and landmark in a neighborhood, the performances summon the absence of the past. The incantations are performed to conjure the memories of land while recalling the human history that still haunts.

In the first iteration of the project, the artist walks upon a historic palm tree at Exposition Park in Los Angeles and performs his point of view through the AR application. The artist summons the presence of the tree as a being and recounts its history. Channeling the possible witness of its surroundings, the artist slowly steps back from the tree and calls out the unsettled events that took place there, as incantations that bring forth multiple haunting dark-colored trees on screen on the land with the AR application. The performance of the artist with the palm tree and the augmented “ghost” tree were recorded and later presented in an online event at 18th Street Arts Center, Santa Monica that invites the viewers to look through a speculative perspective, a nonhuman witness.