"One who knows the Mississippi will promptly aver, not aloud but to himself, that ten thousand River Commissions, with all the mines of the world at their back, cannot tame that lawless stream, cannot curb it or confine it, cannot say to it, Go here, or Go there, and make it obey; cannot save a shore that it has sentenced; cannot bar its path with an obstruction which it cannot tear down, dance over, and laugh at.” -Mark Twain
Each of these projects is a solid state created from a fluid process. Ice melting into paper, molten bronze pouring into an open mold, gypsum cement flowing through paint, wood bent through the heat of steam. These embody a willful loss of control, an outpour of emotion and the acceptance of circumstance. Our realities froze for a moment within the constraints of 2020. That damning year led us to reconsider each day, to find the fractures of our routines and open ourselves to circumstance. As our realities are diverted, our current changes and we continue ever on.
Reclamation
(2021) Ash, Steel. 83” x 50” x 30”, and 48” x 60” x 24”
Kerfed and steam live edge slabs of Ash wood killed by the Emerald Ash borer and displayed within a steel frame.
What’s Left
(2021) Watercolor on paper. 800 pages each 8” x 6” hung on oak. 8’ x 40’
A series of roughly 800 made by placing watercolor atop ice taken from lake Monona and allowed to evaporate over the course of days in winter.
Effusion
(2021) Bronzes, 36” x 24” x ½” and 24” x 18”, smaller sizes variable.
A series of open faced resin bonded sand molds into which molten bronze was poured and later polished.
Hollow
(2021) 24” x 18” x 2”
Woodprint from local Ash stumps killed by the Emerald Ash Borer, printed on paper and framed within local Ash wood
That Lawless Stream
(2021) 5’ x 15’ x 2”
Frescoes made of plaster and paint from Satellite imagery of the Mississippi.