Walk the Burn
This project started as a story Lisa had pitched to an outdoor magazine who was interested in seeing the completed piece; a 30-day study of a controlled burn area for a photo/text article. However, along with the regrowth of the study area, something unexpected happened: a book idea grew out of the regrowth of Walk the Burn, and Lisa started an eagle nest study, and a couple of other projects.
The goal was to find a new species every day. Lisa spent over 600 consecutive days, driving to and from the former town of Beaver, Minnesota; documenting life as she found it, on this land that was returned to its natural state, and now part of the wildlife refuge.
Over the seven seasons, Lisa burned out many DSLR cameras, lenses, flash cards that couldn't keep up with her shooting – over a million images – to record her stories in the valley, or the weather elements.
Walk the Burn documents the life as Lisa found it, a study of the flora and fauna and the regrowth of the land over time; and the harassment Lisa endured while trying to record it.
Under the advisement from two editors, one who shared with Lisa a spiritual message, one that Lisa would understand, in time, what to include in the book. The other editor believed Lisa should disclose the controlled burn and regrowth portion of the only. Lisa held the book back, for the past decade, to think over it.
This book has been on hold because Lisa couldn't release the book as it was, not with 80% of it destroyed by a group of people whose purposeful and willful destruction of her projects: people who followed her steps, left bullet shells at her daily stops, chopped down or off the plants, trees, placed dead animal parts (heads and guts) killed subjects, tampered with her truck, destroyed the life she found and documented.
She prayed and thought deeply what she should do with the book, however, she had to first understand the deeper meaning from her first editor, and after much prayer, decided to publish the book showing what she found, daily, wasn't that the point?
Do you let bullies destroy the good in your heart, the beauty around? By not publishing the book, she was only fueling their eternal rot in their hearts, and fury in their minds, people who have continued to harass her on other documentaries during that time to present.
This book discloses both the beauty and the pure evil minds of people involved who did everything possible to destroy every step of her work, to protect their "projects": starting with the first bullet shell placed in front of one of her daily stops.
Lisa designed two covers for this book. One cover pictures the flames lapping the trees and may have been the obvious choice. However, in Lisa's 600+ day her experience, it was the clouded version that presented itself, as she walked, daily. It pictures what she saw: the view of people who pretended to be friends clouding her view, when, in reality looking through the flames offered the a clearer view, it didn't picture or mirror her true experience.
This is one of the several documentaries Lisa recorded in the Whitewater Valley of Minnesota.
