Nate: I wanted to approach each piece differently, so that it would be refreshing to view each one, and to be sensitive to the environment and how people might interact with the spaces. And it was a chance for me to work with new mediums—like fabric, screen printing, all the sewing. That was a learning curve for me. I also don’t do a lot of pattern-based or abstract work, so this was a chance to do something new to me.

Miriam: My work is an abstract impression of the Navy Yard. I’m working from a romantic idea of just going to a place and drawing. It’s fictional, though—things are not located where they’re supposed to be, and you can’t find your way from the maps in my drawings.

Nate: Each installation is loosely based on nautical themes. Sails at Crescent Park was created because the structures there reminded me of ship masts…Dazzle Wall is based on dazzle patterns painted on ships in World War I, to camouflage them by scattering light. Each pattern is unique and massive. This mural is loosely based on the patterns of those ships—stark, black and white, geometric.

Miriam: Through this project, I also learned that the Navy Yard is a great place to come and have fun, and work, and just enjoy yourself. Even if you work there, you can go to Central Green for racquetball—there are beer gardens, there are races, there are lunch trucks, and that was really exciting for me, because I now think of it as a great place to go, too.