Ben Kinsley: The Lost Champion

(image: Ben Kinsley, The Lost Champion, State Champion Jacaranda Mimosifolia, Santa Ana, CA. Image courtesy of Nick Araya and UFEI website.)

ACTIVATION #1 – EXPLORING

THE LOST CHAMPION

Ben Kinsley with arborists Rhonda Wood and Humberto Mojica

activation one of a five-part series

Saturday, June 27 | 10:00 AM–12:00 PM

Meeting Location: Grand Central Art Center (GCAC), Lobby

This is a free program and includes walking.

Please wear comfortable shoes and bring water.

The Lost Champion.is a public, place-based project by GCAC artist-in-residence Ben Kinsley that memorializes the loss of a national champion tree (Brown-Woolly Fig – Ficus drupacea) that was cut down in Santa Ana, by listening to what remains.

A state or national champion tree is the largest known individual of a specific species, determined through a standardized point system based on height, trunk circumference, and average crown spread. These trees are typically identified through public nomination and maintained in official registers—such as American Forests’ National Champion Tree Program and state-level counterparts like the UFEI California Big Trees Registry—to encourage conservation and appreciation of our largest and most extraordinary trees.

At the heart of The Lost Champion is a series of five guided walking experiences through Santa Ana’s “urban forest,” each offering a different lens for encountering trees as living beings, civic landmarks, and carriers of ecological and cultural memory. The walks are themed Exploring, Measuring, Living With, Listening, and Remembering, and include guided observation, shared conversation, and opportunities for field recording and collective attention. Together, these experiences invite participants to notice what is present, what is changing, and what has been lost—and to consider what it means to care for the trees that shape our everyday environments.

ACTIVATION #1 – EXPLORING

Our experts will lead us to a sycamore tree in downtown Santa Ana that stands beside Historical Site Marker No. 12, which proclaims Santa Ana’s birthplace and was placed in 1976. Along the way, we’ll dig into the lore of Santa Ana’s beginnings and take a fresh look at the current condition of this “historic” tree.

From there, we’ll head to the French Park neighborhood to visit the state champion Goldenrain Tree (Koelreuteria paniculata) and the recently upgraded National Champion Jacaranda (Jacaranda mimosifolia).

As we walk, our guides will share fun, eye-opening insights about Santa Ana’s urban forest—how to spot signs of healthy trees, what “bad pruning” and topping look like in real life, and the everyday conditions that support (or undermine) strong, resilient tree growth in our neighborhoods.

Through guided walks, field recording, and collective attention to sites across Santa Ana that are currently home to state and national champion trees, The Lost Champion explores the urban forest as a living ecosystem—and listening as a form of memory, care, and witness. The project will culminate with Activation #5 at the site of the former national champion tree, incorporating field recordings Ben captured prior to its removal.

The remaining four activations are currently in development—stay tuned to our email announcements. Dates and details will be released soon. 

The Lost Champion is a project led by artist Ben Kinsley, with residency support provided by The Segerstrom Foundation and The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts. 

ACTIVATION #1 GUIDES

Rhonda Wood is President, co-owner, and consulting arborist at Woodworks Tree Preservation, Inc., and an ISA Certified Arborist, ISA Certified Tree Climber, and ISA Tree Risk Assessment Qualified professional (WE-5071AT), with Prescription Pruning credentials. She began her career as a gardener at Disneyland in 1997, became a Topiary Engineer, and in 1999 advanced to certified arborist and climber, helping care for more than 16,000 trees. Over a distinguished tenure at the Disneyland Resort, she served as Tree Assessor, Arborist Manager, and Horticulture Planner, and spent her final decade there as the resort’s first Urban Forester. Rhonda also teaches UCLA Extension’s “Study of Trees” course and is deeply engaged in the profession through leadership and service, including roles with the Western Chapter ISA, the ANSI A300 Committee, tree worker evaluation, post-fire inspection volunteering, and judging regional and national tree climbing championships.

Humberto Mojica is Vice President, co-owner, and consulting arborist at Woodworks Tree Preservation, Inc., and an ISA Certified Arborist, ISA Certified Tree Climber, and ISA Tree Risk Assessment Qualified professional (WE-9670AT), with Prescription Pruning credentials. He spent a decade with Armstrong Growers before joining Disneyland as a gardener in 1997, where he led landscape crews and became a Horticulture Manager in 2003. After studying arboriculture, Humberto became a Certified Arborist and Tree Worker and went on to serve as Arborist Manager for 10 years, helping care for more than 16,000 trees before retiring from the Disneyland Resort in 2023. He also practices woodworking as an artist, preserving wood to carry forward the legacy of trees, and contributes to the field through service including the WCISA Spanish Committee (Arboleros), post-fire tree inspection volunteering, tree worker evaluation, and judging regional and national tree climbing championships.

Ben Kinsley is an interdisciplinary artist working in sound, video, and social/contextual practice, known for projects that range from choreographing a neighborhood intervention into Google Street View and directing surprise performances inside strangers’ homes to staging a royal protest, collecting put-down jokes from around the world, and hosting a lecture series in an aspen grove. His work has been exhibited internationally at venues including the Queens Museum (NYC), Cleveland Museum of Art, MOCA Cleveland, Mattress Factory Museum (Pittsburgh), Katonah Museum of Art (NY), Green on Red Gallery (Dublin), Centro di Cultura Contemporanea Strozzina (Florence), La Galería de Comercio (Mexico City), Catalyst Arts (Belfast), and ZKM Museum of Contemporary Art (Karlsruhe), and he has held residencies at Skowhegan, Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, Skaftfell Art Center (Iceland), Askeaton Contemporary Arts (Ireland), and Platform (Finland). His projects have been featured by NPR, the Associated Press, The Washington Post, Artforum.com, Wired.com, Rhizome.org, and Hyperallergic, among others. Since 2019, Kinsley has collaborated with Riitta Ikonen and Jessica Langley on award-winning mushroom costumes for the Telluride Mushroom Festival—featured in the mockumentary Fest in Show and the film Fantastic Fungi, and highlighted by outlets including Vogue and National Geographic. He is Associate Professor and Co-Director of Visual Art in the Department of Visual & Performing Arts at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs and a co-founder of The Yard.