As an artist, I explore themes of creation and destruction, the illusion of permanence and the inevitability of change. Just as nature transformed the earth over millennia resulting in the world as we know it, including us, so too does humanity both destroy and recreate our planet with an outcome that is both profound and uncertain.
My works serve as an analogy to the powerful forces of both nature and humanity. Using found objects, impermanent media and imagery whose original purpose has become obsolete, I have rearranged their parts to create new and unexpected forms. My work also often contains multiple levels of visual interest, withs pieces having abstract and geometrical structures at a distance, colors and tones with, with closer inspection, reveal remnants of information and additional layers of patterns, forms and materials.
Cartography series
When I conceived of Cartography series piece, I wanted to work large but was not in a location where I could purchase and transport large canvases, so I made the work from small pieces of cardboard I found in the street and piece together. I made a couple of important discoveries working this way. Using “recycled” materials freed me up to be less precious about the work, allowing me to explore themes and styles in a way that I resisted previously. The modularity also allowed me to continuously expand and contract the scale of each work, swapping and exchanging entire sections of a work that could theoretically be any size that I want. I’ve worked on sections of Cartography since 2000 and most recently combined a very large and previously unrelated portions into a mural installation.
Rearranged World series
My “Rearranged World” series serve as an analogy to the destructive and creative processes of both nature and humanity, and how humans try to transform the chaos of nature into order. Each piece begins with letterpress typeset tray, discarded from a Chinese print shop that used a technology that has been supplanted by digital reproduction. Inserted within each niche are strips of maps taken from old atlases, with representations of a “rearranged” world from our recent past, one that has since been further altered by humanity.
