This portfolio page focuses on the motivations and associations that have directed my concepts and projects. You will also find descriptions and examples of many of my films, installations and sculptures. (2013-2005)
Ham Ham Hammocks 2010 / You can enlarge images throughout this site by selecting them.
This grant-funded project was developed in 2011. I am starting my portfolio here, because it is a project that marks a turn towards community. It is a subject that I began considering around that time and I will be finding new ways of working with social culture in the future.
This project was developed in order to provide people a place to relax and visit in the Appalachian Mountains of NC. What you see above are three 15'x25' woven hammocks. They each comfortably hold 15 people. Each hammock had a HAM radio system that audibly connected the three areas. Conversations could spill from one hammock to another. Dozens of pineapples and hams were served for three days. |
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Stoop 2010
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Stoop is a door that can be peered in through peepholes from either side. Audio is fed to headsets on each side. In one set of two peepholes I am seen franticly demanding you to leave. On the other side, you join a sometimes overly-gleeful set of visitors, (including another me, a happy version) found throughout seven peepholes. We are making an attempt to visit with my furious doppelgänger on the other side of the door. To the right is a video-documentation of Stoop. It focusses on the side of the door in which you see the visitors.
Stoop and HHH are two examples of a series of projects that focus on participation of friends and community. These projects ranged from short impromptu films which happened organically around unplanned events, falling between mocumentaries and documentaries, to being the lead artist for educational natural-science events and the videographer/editor of educational documentaries. Also during this period I produced an hour-long feature with dozens of students, friends and other professors filling many roles. They were actors, musicians, technical support, makeup artists, camera operators and they helped in other capacities. This period of work was created during the years I taught as an adjunct college professor in North Carolina near Charlotte. I taught Art History, Kinetic Sculpture, Video classes, Installation classes, Painting, Sculpture and Design classes.
Skip 2004Several years ago, I was thinking about an essay from Richard Long. What was profound for me was his point of view that art can be a simple activity that anyone routinely does. That was stunning. Art does not need to seem 'new' to be Conceptual Art. It can be familiar. Intending to 'keep it simple' for once, I went on a trek in order to interact with anything I found in nature in a spontaneous way. Skip was the outcome.
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Multitaskip 2011Casting stones is a cathartic activity for me. It has brought about in my work: sculptures, films and interactive installations. Frankly, I feel this inspiration continues. I did not realize though, that casting stones would become again a literal art form rather than a muse. Days before this film, something changed... Skipping rocks was again a challenge. The pride retuned- the magic renewed. I was learning to cast all over again...
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Cadence 2005
The goal of skipping stones is usually simple: keep the stone on the surface as long as possible. Doing that is not too far from magic for me. When done well, it seems to go beyond what is possible. I hoped this installation might capture the flashing gleam of beauty found in each connection of a cast stone. The sculpture holds each point of contact simultaneously and the beauty indefinitely.
Cadence was a bridge between installations and films. Before this project, I was creating kinetic sculptures and recording their movement. In this film, I wanted to tell a story- in that there are related events in sequence. After this project my sculptures would be used to describe life cycles of fictitious creatures (much more like storytelling.)
Cadence was a bridge between installations and films. Before this project, I was creating kinetic sculptures and recording their movement. In this film, I wanted to tell a story- in that there are related events in sequence. After this project my sculptures would be used to describe life cycles of fictitious creatures (much more like storytelling.)
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While I created these forms I was thinking about the many tools that must have been developed throughout history which have been lost and forgotten. Creators of tools, I suppose, rarely have experienced their own creation's eventual absence along with no one else having seen it function. Is it possible? I wanted to experience developing a 'tool' that is never seen working by anyone else, then destroy it. In the film, the effects of the sculptures without seeing them function. They would only be seen from the top, yet I crafted them with the same attention to aesthetics that I use with most anything I make.
As you see, if my goal was to guard them from record, I had failed before I had even finished them. In the end, I am glad to have this grainy picture to the left. |
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Turnstile 2004
Turnstile and Weight are examples of the machine installations I was building almost a decade ago. They have kinetic motions driven by inertia, centrifugal force, gravity and viewer interaction. The film is simply documentation of how they work. At that time I was not attempting to create stories.
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Weight 2003
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Often with a handle or a lever, my installations invite a viewer to engage with them. Yet like the creatures in my later films, visually it seems as though they will barely stay functional. These projects are derived from my desire to examine humanity as an outcome of the same source of life as all other living things. I believe, when you consider the visually tenuous nature of my installations, you can get a sense of how I feel about life.
Anemophily 2006
Though I enjoyed the many challenges of Cadence, I learned from R. Long and Giuseppe Penone that art can be nearly effortless, but it is a choice to make it so. Also, after the somber projects I had been making, I felt it was time to allow the joy I feel while 'creating' to show through. Anemophily focused on these two aspects.
In this film the personified pod engages life within the jewel called White Rock Lake. It is a place that often gave me sanctuary during my years in Dallas TX. In short, the story is not that different from any other traditional love story. Enjoy.
In this film the personified pod engages life within the jewel called White Rock Lake. It is a place that often gave me sanctuary during my years in Dallas TX. In short, the story is not that different from any other traditional love story. Enjoy.
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Tops
These are cast-bronze ropes. The coiled forms are visually asymmetrical, yet they are actually balanced with perfection. In the image below, the rather heavy tops were all spun by the same person, and as you see, they are all in motion simultaneously. The version to the left is covered with a second rope as a cushion for usage. Each top has a toy-box.
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Out of the Break 2006
I have always enjoyed making things that seem to barely function - but of course they do. The creatures from Out of the Break exemplify this attribute. What makes the simple excursion tale worthy of retelling, for me, is the beauty found in kinetics. They move with strength and clumsy grace. The environment in which they thrive is a mesmerizing scape. This Arkansas cane-break provides a potent, otherworldly impression which I hope my forms liken.
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Brincadores 2007
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While working as an installation artist, I came to understand that an artwork's environment is as important of a choice to be made as any other decision to be made within it. 'Place' determines the tone of the work and it directs many of my following choices. It not only determines the mood for a viewer, it modifies me. I have come to know it as the most important part of a project. When asking myself, what do I want to make, the next question has become "Where?" Until Brincadores, I had worked where I was comfortable and in the most special locations that brought me inspiration. At this point I gave myself a challenge: What would I do with a place that, rather than feeling 'Edenesque' or otherworldly, looked and felt a bit bland? These projects were created in the Mississippi flood plains of the Arkansas delta region. Was it wise to strip away what I knew was a crucial tool: the power of place?
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Above, a child and I demonstrate how the ‘cotton worm’ works. It is a character from Brincadores, a film that goes along with a series of cotton sculptures and paintings that made up this one-artist show. The left shows a projection screen made from collected cotton; 6’ x 8’ x 6.” This screen was used to project imagery of the agricultural landscapes that this show in Dallas TX were formed around. On the right you can see the actual ceiling where the family that lived in the farmhouse (from the film) stored jars which they obviously used for crops and as currency. The weight of the jars eventually broke the rotten ceiling in places and many had fallen to the ground. I collected these and developed sculptures with them.
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During this time, some personal assumptions about 'myself and place' were proven wrong while others were elevated to fact. For me, it is always wise to find new ways of understanding yourself, to expand your experiences- even within the areas you believe you already understand. The artistic research done while living in this area helped deliver a new appreciation for the cultural history of the region. |
Bunnell Hill Cairn 2008 |
I feel the need to live in an area, or at least have a bond with it before I feel comfortable using it as a setting. I continued my research about 'place' with a residency in the mountains of New York. One of the projects I made during my days there was this time-based cairn. It was created in a remote valley. You cant always tell in my films what is on the other side of the camera. I'll tell you though, I rarely construct an illusion of isolation because I choose places with the actual seclusion I intend to portray. But here, I was immensely deeper than needed, into that reality. As I continue this research today, my location is much deeper still. |
Wood, unaltered stone and rope- these are my default mediums. With W i c k f l i e s, I decided to have a new pallet. Yet like always, the mediums are as they are. Just like a rope tied around unaltered stone or piece of wood, I do not care to mask what materials I use. In my films, motion provides a facade. It is less likely for a viewer to notice that she is looking at a stone, piece of rope or a stick, when it is animated and seemingly is in the middle of a task.
W i c k f l i e s 2009
Balloons, gasses, arrows, feathers from an Indian costume headdress, Christmas ornaments, shish kabob skewers, trick-candles, fireworks, party-horns and Chinese finger-cuffs
For years I have wanted to discuss the amazement I feel towards fireflies through an artwork. They are a creature living two lives; a pest to be swatted away by day- and a miracle spirit to be chased by night. My intention was that opening my material choices to whimsical possibilities would help me reach a closer rung to the impossible task of matching a firefly's enchantment. Taking place on the coast of Georgia and throughout North Carolina, to the left is W i c k f l i e s, the full version (20 min).
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